Drug case: Akali leader Bikram Majithia gets protection from arrest for 3 days, approaches SC

Majithia’s lawyers make a request for early hearing in Supreme Court and get listing date of plea for January 27

The Punjab and Haryana high court has granted three days protection from arrest to Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) leader and former Punjab minister Bikram Singh Majithia to enable him to approach the Supreme Court for an anticipatory bail in a drug case registered the Punjab Police on December 20.

The interim protection of 3 days to Akali leader Bikram Singh Majithia from Monday was granted by a Punjab and Haryana high court even as his bail plea was dismissed.

The interim protection for 3 days from Monday was granted by the HC bench of Justice Lisa Gill the same day even as the bail plea was dismissed. The detailed order was released on Tuesday.

Also, Majithia’s lawyers made a request for early hearing in the Supreme Court on Tuesday and got the listing date of plea for January 27, it is learnt.

Majithia had moved the high court after he failed to get anticipatory bail plea from Mohali court on December 24. On January 10, the HC, giving him interim protection, asked the SAD leader to join the probe two days later.

‘Petitioner was at the helm of affairs’

The high court in its order observed that “complete and thorough investigation should not be a casualty in this political slugfest especially keeping in view grave and serious charges of drug trade”.

“It cannot be denied that the petitioner indeed was at the helm of affairs at the time of occurrence of alleged offence(s),” the bench said, adding that Majithia is not entitled to relief merely because no action was taken by the state government for these long years. It also took note of the fact that he was related to former deputy chief minister and former union minister.

Majithia is the brother-in-law of SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal who was Punjab deputy chief minister till 2017. The drug racket case was unearthed in 2013 and allegations against Majithia had cropped up by 2014.

The special task force (STF) report, which became the basis of the FIR, was submitted in 2018 in the high court.

“The report in question was duly handed over to the state and therefore delay in the case has occurred due to tardiness of the state machinery. The allegations that entire official machinery has been roped in to register case against him are not substantiated. Such an averment indeed appears to be far-fetched in the given circumstances,” the bench said.

An effort is now being made by the state to break the nexus between the state machinery and the drug traffickers and the courts find no ground to scuttle the same at this stage, it said.

The court also took serious note of the state police’s allegations of non-cooperation by Majithia when he was quizzed after interim protection on January 10.

The state has successfully made a case of custodial interrogation in the face of his conduct, the court said, referring to an instance where Majithia told the police that a photo album of his marriage has got misplaced.

However, his counsel told the court that he was ready to produce in court or give it to an inspector general of police or a director general of police but not to the investigating officer.

“This manner and conduct of the petitioner lends credence to the assertion of learned counsel of the state that the petitioner has not extended full cooperation to the investigating agency,” the court said.

The bench observed that there was no embargo on the state government from proceeding to register FIR against Majithia even as STF report is lying in a sealed cover in the high court.

On the allegations of “bias” against then STF head Harpreet Singh Sidhu, who had prepared the STF report, the court said he has clarified that the inquiry was conducted in an impartial manner.