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SC bail to Bhupesh Baghel’s ex-deputy secretary: ‘How long can you keep a person in jail’

A bench of Justices Surya Kant, Dipankar Datta and Ujjal Bhuyan said she will remain suspended from service till further orders.

SC bail to Baghel’s ex-deputy secretary: ‘How long can you keep a person in jail’

Chhattisgarh’s former chief minister Bhupesh Baghel

THE Supreme Court Wednesday granted bail to suspended IAS officer Saumya Chaurasia, who was deputy secretary to Chhattisgarh’s former chief minister Bhupesh Baghel, in a money laundering case linked to an alleged coal levy scam, while noting that that she had already spent a year and nine months in prison and the charges were yet to be framed.

A bench of Justices Surya Kant, Dipankar Datta and Ujjal Bhuyan said she will remain suspended from service till further orders. “Without expressing any opinion on merits, and with a view to give an opportunity of elaborate hearing to the parties on the next date, we direct that petitioner be released on interim bail, subject to furnishing of bail bonds to the satisfaction of trial court,” the court ordered.

Justice Bhuyan also questioned the ED’s conviction rate and how long an accused can be kept in prison without charges being framed. “Without charges being framed, how long can you keep a person in jail? Sentence is seven years. What is the rate of conviction in PMLA cases? In Parliament they said only in 41 cases there has been conviction… then? You keep a person in jail for years,” the judge told the law officer representing the Enforcement Directorate.

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The bench also noted that some of the co-accused in the case had already got bail and that the High Court had said that charges could not be framed as non-bailable warrants against some of the accused could not be executed.

The ED had arrested Chaurasia on December 2, 2022 over allegations or existence of a cartel involving senior bureaucrats, businessmen, politicians and middlemen, which was allegedly extorting a levy of Rs 25 per tonne for coal transported in Chhattisgarh.

The ED alleged that the proceeds of the crime were used for “investing in benami assets and bribing officials.

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