A Vacation Bench of the Supreme Court is convening on Wednesday to hear an appeal by Republic TV editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami against the Bombay High Court’s decision refusing him immediate relief in a case of abetment to suicide.
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A Bench of Justices D.Y. Chandrachud is scheduled to hear the case at 10.30 a.m.. The court is closed otherwise for the whole week for Deepavali. Its website shows the petition was filed at 10.23 a.m. on Tuesday.
On November 7, the High Court refused to order Mr. Goswami's release under its extraordinary writ jurisdiction. It asked him to seek regular bail from the trial court and directed the trial court to decide his bail plea within four days. It refrained from quashing the First Information Report (FIR) registered against him. It also did not stay the investigation.
The Division Bench of the High Court, in a 57-page detailed order, explained that investigation of a case was “exclusively within the domain of the investigation agencies over which the courts cannot have control and have no power to stifle or impinge”. The court needed to interfere only if the police were not following the prescribed procedure, it stated.
Also read: Republic TV editor Arnab Goswami, two others arrested in abetment to suicide case
On the plea to quash the FIR registered in the case in May 2018, it said this power should only be used with great restraint in “rare and appropriate cases” to prevent abuse of law.
Case concocted: Salve
Senior advocate Harish Salve, for Mr. Goswami, had called the case “concocted” and prima facie an act of revenge for his news coverage, which questioned those in power in the State of Maharashtra”.
Mr. Goswami argued that the case, leading to his arrest at his residence on November 4, was a “brazen attempt of vendetta politics against him and his channel”. He contended that the case was decisively closed by the Mumbai Police in 2019 by submitting an ‘A’ Summary report. Besides, the Chief Judicial Magistrate had noted in the remand order of November 4 that the court's consent was not taken before police started reinvestigating the case.
The High Court explained that filing an ‘A’ Summary report did not preclude a police officer from resuming the probe on the receipt of fresh material.
Rule 219 of the Bombay Police Manual says an ‘A’ Summary is filed when a crime is committed but there is no clue about the culprit or there is not enough evidence to send an accused for trial.
“Law does not mandate taking prior permission of magistrate for further investigation”, the High Court noted. Further, the family of the victims in the case was “admittedly” not given an opportunity to persuade the magistrate before the closure of the case earlier, it pointed out.
