Supreme Court rejects Punjab govt plea against bail to Sukhpal Singh Khaira

The Punjab government had filed the plea in the apex court against the January order of the High Court.

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a plea by the Punjab government against the High Court’s order granting bail to Congress MLA Sukhpal Singh Khaira in a case registered against him under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act.

A bench of Justices Bela M Trivedi and K V Vishwanathan said the court is not inclined to interfere with the high court order.

Appearing for Khaira, senior advocate P S Patwalia claimed that the State government had acted with malice against his client.

The Punjab government filed the plea in the apex court against the January 4 order of the high court.

Senior advocate Sidharth Luthra for the Punjab government, said the High Court has not considered that there is evidence against Khaira, including material, which the state had gathered from the Enforcement Directorate.

He said Khaira has threatened a person, who is going to make a statement against him. He asked the court to stay the high court's order but the bench did not agree with his contention.

The Punjab government had contended that the bail order completely ignored Section 37 of NDPS Act which required the court to be satisfied that there were reasonable grounds for believing that the accused was not guilty of such offence and that he was not likely to commit any offence while on bail.

After the high court’s order granting bail to Khaira in the NDPS case, he was arrested by the Punjab Police in a fresh case registered at Subhanpur police station on a complaint filed by the wife of a key witness in the 2015 drugs case, accusing him of criminal intimidation. 

However, on January 15, 2024, he was granted bail by a Kapurthala court in the second case.