MUHAMMAD ARIF and another vs THE STATE and another
This matter arises from a criminal petition for post-arrest bail filed by two petitioners who were arrested in connection with an FIR registered by the Assistant Manager of MEPCO/WAPDA Sub-Division, Sira-e-Sidhu District Khanewal, concerning a violent protest by a mob of approximately one thousand persons that caused extensive property damage and arson. The core legal question is whether the petitioners are entitled to post-arrest bail when they were merely named among a massive mob without specific attribution of roles or weapons, and after suffering prolonged judicial detention. The Lahore High Court held that the petitioners have made out a case for further inquiry due to the lack of specific role attribution, the mystery surrounding their identification among a thousand protesters, and discriminatory singling out while hundreds of other participants remained unarrested. The court established the principle that where accused persons are part of a massive mob without specific overt acts attributed to them individually, and have undergone a substantial period of detention, their continued incarceration becomes harsh and warrants the grant of bail pending trial.
- Whether an accused person is entitled to post-arrest bail when merely named as part of a massive mob without specific attribution of a role or weapon?
- Does the prolonged incarceration of accused persons without specific role attribution in a mass crime constitute a ground for further inquiry under bail jurisprudence?
ORDER
1. ' MANSOOR AKBAR KOKAB, J.---Present petitioners are only arrested ones out of allegedly more than one thousand persons' mob protesting against MEPCO/WAPDA Sub-Division, Sira-e-Sidhu District Khanewal, the Assistant Manager who lodged the complaint with Police Station Sira-e-Sidhu, District Khanewal on 21-7-2009, wherein he nominated that 32 named persons forming a band, led the mob and had broken the main gate of the complainant's office, while out of 1000, approximately 300 persons entered into the office, causing severe damage to the property i.e, furniture, stationery, store items, motorcycle, computer, admirals and certain other thing valuing approximately Rs,15,00,000 to Rs,20,00,000, besides setting on fire the record of the office. The eye- witnesses mentioned in the F.I.R. Are the employees of the WAPDA and the colleagues of the complainant.
2. Surprisingly out of 1000 persons only the present two were arrested and as they were named in the F.I.R., it remains a mystery whether the present petitioners being private persons were well-known to the complainant by name and parentage as there is no mention of the facts that these two persons were apprehended on the spot either by the complainant, his colleagues or even by the police or the F.I.R. Was chalked out later than the disclosure of their names to the complainant. The present petitioners had suffered judicial detention for long period of more than 2-1/2 months in spite of the fact that neither any specific role was attributed to them nor the specific arm is attributed in the F.I.R. At the best their role can be attributed only been among the members of the huge mob comprising 1000 persons. Making them singled out or such a large number of mob and to confine them in the judicial lock-up for such a long period appears hard and harsh act especially when the allegations against the present accused persons can be attributed to each and every member of the mob or at least 300 unknown persons accompanying them, who had been said to have entered into the office and took the employees to task besides causing damage to the property in a manner referred hereinabove. This discrimination makes them to have a case of further enquiry. Hence they are admitted to bail subject to their furnishing bail bonds in the sum of Rs,50,000 each with one surety each in the like amount to the satisfaction of the learned trial Court.