Delhi Confidential: Rajeev Chandrasekhar is on a mission in Gujarat

Habitual Offence

Hearing a plea for anticipatory bail, Justice Surya Kant, presiding over a two-judge Supreme Court bench, remarked how some accused go back to committing offences after getting bail. Recalling a “personal experience”, the judge said he has some agricultural land and there is a tubewell in it. One day, he said, the caretaker called and informed that some copper wires extending to the tubewell had been stolen. “I told him nothing can be done — you go and lodge a report with the local police. I went to court and he went to lodge the complaint. And he told [the police] it’s the land of so-and-so and theft has taken place. The first remark the SHO made, he said, ‘what to do? Yeh jo chor hai, isko parson court ne release kiya thha. Isliye karli chori isne aate hi (he was released by court only the day before, so he committed theft as soon as he came out).” The bench had a hearty laugh before denying the relief sought for.