E-Paper
‘You threatened to circulate her photos’: SC declines pre-arrest bail for Bengal man
The Supreme Court told the petitioner who sought pre-arrest bail: “In our society, we do not tolerate such activities of taking photographs of young women and then to threaten them. It can be appreciated by only those persons who have daughters.”
NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday declined to grant an arrest shield to a West Bengal resident accused of threatening to leak objectionable photographs and videos of a woman, observing that “such activities cannot be tolerated in our society”.
“No case is made out for anticipatory bail. The allegations against you are serious that you took nude photos of a young woman and threatened to circulate it. These were recovered from your possession,” the bench of justices MR Shah and Aniruddha Bose said on a petition by West Bengal resident Soumyabrata Pal.
Pal’s petition for anticipatory bail sought to argue that the complaint against him was frivolous and false and the woman suppressed the fact that she was a director along with him in the same company.
In her complaint to the police on October 18 last year, the woman told the police that she was in a relationship with Pal when she was a minor and it was during this time that he took her private photographs and videos, which he was threatening to circulate.
The bench observed: “In our society, we do not tolerate such activities of taking photographs of young women and then to threaten them. It can be appreciated by only those persons who have daughters.”
Since the incident pertained to the period when the woman was a minor, Pal faced charges of sexual harassment and abetment punishable under Sections 12 and 17 of Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 (Pocso), besides offences of cheating (IPC Section 420), criminal breach of trust (IPC Section 406) and criminal intimidation (IPC Section 506) in the FIR registered with Chandernagore police station in Hooghly district.
In December last year, Pal received summons to cooperate with the investigation and has apprehended his arrest since then.
On April 7, the trial court declined his request for anticipatory bail. He later appealed to the Calcutta high court which refused to grant him pre-arrest bail on May 5.
According to the police, a sum in excess of ₹1 crore was transferred from the personal account of the victim to the accused and this was stated to be done under duress.
Advocate Rohit Dutta who appeared for Pal said both the high court and trial judge overlooked the fact that the petitioner and complainant were and are still directors of a company and the money allegedly received by his client was part of transactions occurring in the due course of business of the said company.
“It is submitted that the complainant out of spite and jealousy, and with utmost mala fides, has filed the complaint against the petitioner only to disgrace and tarnish the reputation of the petitioner before the right-thinking members of the society,” the petition said.
Dutta told the court that the petitioner was willing to abide by any conditions to be imposed as he has been cooperating with the investigation so far. Pal submitted in his petition that “grave injustice would be caused to the petitioner if pre-arrest bail is not granted to him, especially when the allegations against the petitioner are baseless and unfounded.”
