KOCHI: The Kerala high court on Saturday ordered police not to arrest actor Dileep until Thursday in the new case alleging conspiracy to kill police officers who probed the actress assault case of 2017.
After considering an anticipatory bail plea filed by Dileep, his brother P Sivakumar, and brother-in-law TN Suraj, justice Gopinath P said a thorough investigation is required into the allegations. The court ordered them to appear for interrogation before the crime branch between 9am and 8pm on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday.
Directing the petitioners to fully cooperate with the investigation, the court warned in the order that any attempt to interfere with the course of investigation in any manner will entail cancellation of the protection granted against arrest. Further, the court directed prosecution to submit a report in sealed cover on 27th regarding the interrogation of the petitioners and any other materials that may be collected by the prosecution.
The court’s order came after hearing the case offline in a special sitting conducted in view of the large size of the files involved. Senior advocate B Raman Pillai argued for Dileep and the other accused that the first statement of film director Balachandra Kumar did not mention about conspiracy to harm the police officers and it was added in a subsequent statement. Even if all the statements given are taken into account, offences alleged have not been committed, the counsel argued.
While prosecution has every right to investigate the allegations, it cannot insist for custody of the petitioners as no offence is made out, the counsel submitted. Prosecution handed over a sealed cover to the court. In its order, the court recorded thus, “TA Shaji, the director general of proseuction instructed by P Narayanan, the senior public proseuctor had handed over to me in a sealed cover certain materials collected by the investigating agency which suggest that an in-depth investigation is required into the matter. It would not be appropriate for me to refer to or make any findings concerning those materials as that would be highly improper at this stage.
I have referred to them only to emphasize that a thorough investigation is required into the matter.” The director general of prosecution vehemently opposed the plea and even granting an interim order of protection, contending that the success of investigation in cases of criminal conspiracy will depend very much on the kind of custody available to the prosecution.
When the accused are protected by an order of bail or any order of protection from arrest, it would very often be difficult for the prosecution to prove the case against the accused, he argued. Alleging that Dileep is very influential, prosecution submitted that its experience in the earlier case is that he will take every possible effort to influence witnesses and to change the course of the investigation.
However, Dileep’s counsel replied that prosecution is not remediless if any condition imposed while granting anticipatory bail or interim protection is violated and that prosecution can seek cancellation of bail or interim protection. The counsel also argued that a court considering bail application should be circumspect in referring to materials handed over by prosecution in a sealed cover.
Citing a 2019 Supreme Court 2019 judgment , the court said while it would be inappropriate for it to rely upon and quote from such materials handed over by the prosecution, there is no bar in considering them to satisfy the judicial conscience of the court regarding the entitlement of the accused to bail. The court then issued the order granting interim protection from arrest and directed the petitioners to appear for questioning.
