Bombay HC grants bail to two persons booked under UAPA over alleged links to Dawood Ibrahim

Bombay High Court grants bail to individuals linked to Dawood Ibrahim, stating association with him doesn't invoke UAPA provisions.

 While granting bail to two persons booked under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA), the Bombay High Court observed that a person’s association with fugitive gangster Dawood Ibrahim or his gang will not attract provisions of the stringent law as he has been declared a “terrorist” in his individual capacity under the Act.

A Division Bench of Justices Bharati Dangre and Manjusha Deshpande, in an order dated July 11, the details of which were made available on July 19, granted bail to Parvez Zubair Vaid and Faiz Shakeel Bhiwandiwala, who were arrested in a drug seizure case by the Maharashtra Anti Terrorism Squad in August 2022.

They were booked for their alleged links with Dawood’s crime syndicate under provisions of the UAPA, Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, and Indian Penal Code.

The Bench noted that the Union government had issued a notification on September 4, 2019 declaring “Dawood Ibrahim Kaskar as a ‘terrorist’ under the UAPA”.

The Bench said the UAPA has separate provisions for activities of individuals and organisations, and the evidence presented in Mr. Vaid’s case would not be sufficient to charge him under Section 20 of the Act, which prescribes punishment for being a member of a terrorist gang or organisation.

“In our view, prima facie, the offence of Section 20 of the UAPA would not be attracted as Dawood Ibrahim Kaskar has been declared as a terrorist in individual capacity. Therefore, any association with him on the pretext that a person belongs to D-gang/Dawood gang will not attract the provisions of Section 20,” the court said.

Mr. Vaid had approached the High Court for bail through his counsels, senior advocate Mihir Desai and advocates Samsher Garud, Vighnesh Iyer and Dhwani Parekh, who argued that the chargesheet does not contain an iota of material to establish the accusations levelled against the accused, particularly under the provisions of UAPA and the NDPS Act. The material contained in the chargesheet does not even remotely connect the appellants with the alleged offences, the counsels argued.