Ajay Kerkar, the promoter of Cox and Kings, requested bail in connection with a money laundering case, but the Bombay High Court denied his request. On the grounds of a postponed trial, a one-judge panel led by Justice Prithviraj K. Chavan determined that Kerkar was not eligible for bail.
It should be mentioned that, even under Section 436A, CrPC, the right to an extension of bail following a period of incarceration longer than half of the minimum sentence is not unqualified. In its order dated January 10, the Court stated that it was still within its rights to refuse the relief on the grounds that included the accused’s request for a trial delay.
Ajay Kerkar, the applicant, had gone to the High Court in an attempt to obtain bail under Section 436A of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The longest an undertrial prisoner may be held is specified in Section 436A. According to the section’s proviso, no such individual shall be held for longer than half the maximum amount of time that the law permits for the offence.
In November 2020, Kerkar was taken into custody in relation to a bank fraud case involving claims of financial misbehaviour against the Cox and King Group Company, which has been insolvent since 2019. As an undertrial prisoner, he spent two years and 340 days in prison, over three years total. This is half of the punishment that Section 4 of the Prevention of Money-Laundering Act (PMLA) stipulates for an offence involving money laundering.
He argued that because there had been an excessive amount of delay in starting the trial, he should be granted bail as charges had not yet been filed in the case. The Enforcement Directorate disagreed with the bail plea (ED). Hiten Venegaonkar, the ED’s attorney, said that Kerkar had not yet earned the right to bail under Section 436A of the CrPC.
The attorney went on to say that such a right to bail would only materialise on the day that the maximum sentence allowed by Section 4 of the PMLA would have elapsed. In the current case, the ED’s attorney contended that this term had not yet ended. In accordance with the ED’s arguments, the Court denied Kerkar’s request for bail.
