Mumbai Observing it was the prosecution’s fault and there was no illegality committed by the magistrate in passing the bail order, a special NDPS court recently refused to cancel the bail granted to TV comedian Bharti Singh and her husband Haarsh Limbachiyaa, almost three years after they were released from jail in a drugs case.

The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) had moved the special NDPS court in 2020 seeking cancellation as a magistrate’s court granted them the relief after neither the NCB nor the public prosecutor representing the investigating agency appeared before the court to make submissions on the bail pleas.

The special NDPS court pointed out that when the matter was posted a day after the bail plea was filed in the magistrate’s court, the agency did not come to court. “Therefore, it is not the case that (the) prosecution was not given (an) opportunity to oppose the applications but it is fault on the part of the prosecution that they did not avail the opportunity to file reply and to oppose the bail applications. The prosecution neither filed reply on bail applications nor filed any application for adjournment seeking time to file reply...Even investigating officer and special public prosecutor failed to appear before the court. Therefore, it is fault of prosecution,” the court said.

As pointed out by the couple’s advocates Ayaz Khan and Zehra Charania, the court also said that the offence involves punishment of up to one year in jail or with a fine of Rs 10,000 or both. “Since (the) present offence does not fall under category of any of the offences as given in Sec 37-Bof NDPS Act, the condition of giving opportunity to the public prosecutor is not applicable,” the court said.

The court also said that there are no allegations against the accused about their interference with the administration of justice, evasion or attempting to evade the due course of justice or about abusing the concession granted to them in any manner. “There are no allegations of committal of breach of conditions of bail order granted by… magistrate. Therefore, there are absolutely no grounds made out for cancellation of bail to the respondents. . . The application is devoid of merits and is liable to be rejected,” the court said.

In November 2020, the NCB allegedly recovered 86.5 grams of marijuana, also known as ganja, from Bharti and Haarsh’s home and office and they were taken into custody. In October 2022, NCB submitted chargesheet in which it cited statement of accused-turned approver Sowmiyanarayanan (23), a Bandra (E) musician, recorded before a magistrate’s court.