Terror Funding Case: Supreme Court sets aside Delhi HC’s bail order for Zahoor Watali

The Supreme Court today set aside the decision of the Delhi High Court to grant bail to Zahoor Watali, one of the accused in the terror funding case being probed by the National Investigation Agency..In the judgment delivered by the Bench of Justices AM Khanwilkar and Ajay Rastogi, the Court allowed the appeal filed by NIA against the Delhi High Court’s decision and affirmed the decision of the Supreme Court to reject Watali’s bail in the case..Facts.Watali is one of the ten accused persons from the State of Jammu and Kashmir who has been named in the First Information Report (FIR) registered by the NIA in relation to cases of terror funding. The NIA had carried out raids in this regard in 2017 and FIR was registered on May 30, 2017..Watali, who is charged with various offences under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), filed an application before the Special NIA Court in New Delhi seeking bail but his application was rejected. He then moved the Delhi High Court in September 2018. The High Court reversed the lower Court’s decision and granted bail to Watali, although subject to certain conditions. It was against this decision of the High Court that the NIA moved the Supreme Court..Submissions before the Supreme Court.Attorney General KK Venugopal, arguing for the NIA, had submitted that the High Court “virtually conducted a mini-trial”. He argued that the High Court ought to have considered the totality of the evidence available against the Respondent at the stage of prayer for bail. The High Court had discarded certain statements of witnesses as being inadmissible and it was NIA’s case that the admissibility of evidence is a matter for trial. The judgment states,.“According to the appellant, the High Court has virtually conducted a mini trial and even questioned the genuineness of the documents relied upon by the Investigating Agency… The analysis done by the High Court is bordering on being perverse as it has virtually conducted a mini trial at the stage of consideration of the prayer for bail.”.The Counsel for the Respondent, however, maintained that “no evidence was forthcoming” to prove the Respondent’s complicity in the commission of the alleged offences and therefore, the Delhi High Court was right in granting bail..The Verdict.The Court analyzed the orders passed by both, the High Court as well as the Special NIA Court. The judgment also stated the settled law on various points of consideration in a case for bail and went on to examine the evidence on record against the accused while arriving at its conclusion..The Court took a favourable view of the Attorney General’s submissions and found reasonable ground to believe that the accusations against Watali are prima facie true. The Court, thus stated,.“We find force in the argument of the appellant that the High Court, in the present case, adopted an inappropriate approach whilst considering the prayer for grant of bail. The High Court ought to have taken into account the totality of the material and evidence on record as it is and ought not to have discarded it as being inadmissible. The High Court clearly overlooked the settled legal position that, at the stage of considering the prayer for bail, it is not necessary to weigh the material, but only form opinion on the basis of the material before it on broad probabilities.”.Noting that the Supreme Court, in this case, is not called upon to consider the prayer for cancellation of bail but merely to consider the correctness of the approach adopted by the High Court, the Bench concluded that the High Court erred in its approach..Thus, the Court reversed the order of the High Court and concurred with the decision of the Designated Court holding that the respondent is not entitled to the grant of bail in this case..Read the judgment: