New Delhi: The Supreme Court has ruled that magistrates do not have the competence under the relevant provisions of the UAPA (Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act) law to extend the time given to probe agencies to complete investigation in cases registered under the Act, LiveLaw has reported.
A three-judge bench of Justices Uday Umesh Lalit, S. Ravindra Bhat and Belam M. Trivedi held that only the “court” as specified in Section 43-D (2)(b) of the UAPA is the competent authority to grant such an extension. The judges further clarified that the “court” in UAPA cases refers to special courts set up under the National Investigation Agency (NIA) Act, but not any other court.
The apex court was hearing a plea filed by one Sadique from Madhya Pradesh against the chief judicial magistrate of Bhopal, who had extended time for investigation in a UAPA case up to 180 days in which he was accused. The magistrate had also refused to grant bail to the accused, after he filed a bail plea stating that the investigation agency had failed to file a chargesheet against the accused in the prescribed 90 days. Therefore, his claim that he was entitled to default bail had also been rejected. Upholding the magistrate’s ruling, the high court of Madhya Pradesh too dismissed the accused’s petition, stating that his plea was not maintainable under Section 167(2) of the IPC.
Siddhartha Dave, Sadique’s counsel, told the apex court that the magistrate of Bhopal extended the time of investigation without considering the fact granting such an extension was beyond the purview of the official concerned. Dave cited Bikramjit Singh vs State of Punjab (2020) to buttress his argument.
In the Bikramjit Singh case, the Supreme Court had stated that all offences registered under UAPA, whether being investigated by Central agencies or the state government, should be tried exclusively by special courts set up NIA Act.
Relying on the said verdict, the three-judge bench said a special court alone has the jurisdiction to extend the time to 180 days under the first proviso in Section 43-D(2)(b) of UAPA.
“After considering various provisions of the relevant statues, it was concluded that “so far as all offences under the UAPA are concerned, the Magistrate’s jurisdiction to extend time under the first proviso in Section 43-D (2)(b) is nonexistent”. Consequently, in so far as “Extension of time to complete investigation” is concerned, the Magistrate would not be competent to consider the request and the only competent to consider authority such request would be “the Court” as specified in the proviso in Section 43-D (2)(b) of the UAPA,” the three-judge bench ruled.
Besides the ruling, the Supreme Court also granted bail to the accused, as chargesheet is yet to be filed in the case.