Republic Day violence: Delhi court grants bail to man, says no specific role assigned to him

PTI, Mar 1, 2021, 8:54 PM IST

New Delhi: A Delhi court Monday granted bail to a man in a case related to the violence on Republic Day during farmers’ tractor parade against the Centre’s three new agri laws, saying no specific role has been assigned to him.

The court said the accused was not alleged to have attempted to kill or hurt the police personnel deployed.

Additional Sessions Judge Amitabh Rawat granted the relief to Ashish Kumar on furnishing a bail bond of Rs 15,000 with one surety of like amount in the case.

The court said the ground of bail calls for balancing the paramount right of the individual, that is right to liberty, on one hand, and the right of the investigating agency to investigate.

“As per the case of the prosecution on January 26, 2021, applicant (Ashish) was detained at Chintamani Chowk since at around 12.50 pm around 500 protesters on tractors rally and cars were coming from Apsara Border flyover and they had broken the barricade in a violent manner. People driving tractors had tried to run over the police personnel.

However, there is no specific role assigned to the accused in as much as the accused himself is not alleged to have attempted to kill or hurt the police personnel deployed in law and arrangement duty,” it said in its order.

It further said the best case of the prosecution was that the accused had participated in the said rally/unlawful assembly at the relevant time, thereby attracting imputation under section 149 (unlawful assembly) IPC.

It added that the car in which the accused was driving has also been seized from the place of incident in damaged condition.

“The accused is in custody since January 26, 2021, and no purpose will be served by keeping him in custody any further. There is no previous record of the accused nor there are any chances of him tampering with the evidence,” the court said.

It directed him not to contact the witnesses in the case or try to influence them.

During the hearing, advocate Arun Sharma, appearing for Ashish claimed he had been falsely implicated in the case.

Additional Public Prosecutor Vikas Kumar, appearing for the state, opposed the bail plea saying the offences against the accused were serious in nature.

According to the police, Ashish was allegedly a part of the unlawful assembly on January 26, 2021, which had indulged in violence, damaged public property and attempted to run over the police personnel with tractors.

Tens of thousands of protesting farmers clashed with the police in the national capital on January 26 during a tractor parade to highlight their demands.

Many of them driving tractors reached the Red Fort and entered the monument, where a religious flag was also hoisted. Over 500 police personnel were injured and one protestor died.