The Supreme Court on January 24 cancelled the bail granted to former DHFL promoters Kapil Wadhawan and his brother Dheeraj Wadhawan in the multi-crore rupees bank loan scam case. A Bench of Justices Bela M. Trivedi and S. C. Sharma said the high court and the trial court committed error in granting bail to them.
"We have no hesitation that the charge sheet having been filed and cognisance being taken in due time, respondents could not have claimed statutory bail as a right," the Bench said.
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Under the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), an accused becomes entitled for grant of statutory bail if the probe agency fails to file the charge sheet on conclusion of the investigation in a criminal case within 60 or 90 days period.
In this case, the CBI filed the charge sheet on the 88th day after registration of the FIR and the trial court granted default bail to the accused and the Delhi High Court upheld the order.
The Wadhawan brothers were arrested in this case on July 19 last year. The high court, however, had clarified it did not go into the merits of the case. The charge sheet was filed on October 15, 2022 and cognisance was taken. The FIR in the case was based on a complaint made by the Union Bank of India.
