HC removes bail condition for Rhea Chakraborty to seek trial court’s nod, says ‘required to travel abroad being actor’

A single-judge bench of Justice Neela K Gokhale on September 26 passed an order on the actor’s application, a copy of which was made available on Monday.

Rhea was arrested in September 2020 in connection with a drugs case and granted bail in October 2020 by a single-judge bench of Justice Sarang V Kotwal. Among the conditions of her bail was seeking permission from the court before travelling out of the country and to deposit her passport with the probing agency.

Advocate Ayaz Khan, representing the actor, sought deletion of the said two conditions arguing she had complied with all bail conditions without any complaint of violation and while chargesheet was filed in the case, charges were yet to be framed by trial court. The lawyer said she required to travel abroad for shooting, meeting with producers, participating in auditions and has been confirmed for a web series for which she was required to travel to different countries.

Khan argued seeking trial court permission for every foreign travel caused “tremendous delay,” loss of assignments, and sought the same relaxations granted to eight co-accused who were granted bail by trial court.

However, advocate S K Halwasia for NCB opposed the plea stating that the applicant involved in serious offences “should not be given any special treatment only because she is a celebrity” and raised apprehension that she may not return to India.

Justice Gokhale observed, “Undoubtedly, since the applicant is an actor, she is required to travel abroad for work-related reasons. Since the said conditions have been relaxed for the other eight accused, I see no reason why the present applicant be continued to be imposed with these conditions.”

The judge added that as the applicant had cooperated with the trial till date and was not found violating any bail conditions and had returned from abroad whenever she travelled with court’s permission, there was “no reason to doubt that the applicant may not be available for expeditious conclusion of the trial.”

The HC allowed her application and deleted the two conditions. It clarified that Chakraborty shall appear before the trial court on every date unless express exemption by the court and shall cooperate with expeditious disposal of the pending trial. Moreover, she is required to inform prosecuting agency about her itinerary and contact details at least four days before her departure and keep her phone switched on at all times and also intimate the agency on her return to India.

Meanwhile, the special court on Monday allowed the similar application by Rhea’s brother and co-accused Showik Chakraborty and directed the agency to return his passport within 15 days.

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