Recently, The Supreme Court stated that directing the accused to submit a Demand Draft of Rs. 10 Lakhs as ad-interim victim compensation, to avail the benefit of pre-arrest bail is not justifiable.

The bench of Justices Ajay Rastogi and C.T. Ravikumar was dealing with an appeal filed by the appellant-husband against the condition incorporated by the High Court by of Jharkhand,  indicating that for pre-arrest bail, he has to deposit a Demand Draft of Rs. 10 Lakhs as ad-interim victim compensation in favour of Respondent No. 2 – wife.

In this case, an application was filed by the appellant husband seeking dissolution of marriage and the wife also instituted a Criminal Complaint against the appellant (husband) before the Chief Judicial Magistrate, which was later converted to FIR for offences under Section 498A, 120B, 323, 324 IPC read with Section 3/4 Dowry Prohibition Act.

Being the non-cognizable offence, the appellant approached the Court by filing an application seeking pre-arrest bail. 

The High Court passed the order directing the appellant to submit a Demand Draft of Rs. 10 Lakhs as ad-interim victim compensation, to permit the appellant to avail the benefit of pre-arrest bail.

The court said, “After we have heard counsel for the parties, we find no reasonable justification for the High Court to call upon the appellant to submit a demand draft of Rs.10 lakhs in availing the benefit of pre-arrest bail. The appeal stands allowed and the order passed by the High Court directing the appellant to deposit a Demand Draft of Rs. 10 Lakhs is hereby set aside.”

Supreme Court stated that “we find no reasonable justification for the High Court to call upon the appellant to submit a demand draft of Rs.10 lakhs in availing the benefit of pre-arrest bail.”

In view of the above, the bench allowed the appeal of the husband.  

Case Title: Ravikant Srivastava v. The State of Jharkhand & Anr.