New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday set aside the Kerala High Court order granting anticipatory bail to four persons in connection with the 1994 ISRO espionage case relating to the alleged framing of space scientist Nambi Narayanan. The Court was hearing the CBI's appeal against the Kerala High Court order granting bail to former Gujarat DGP R B Sreekumar, two former police officers of Kerala S Vijayan and Thampi S Durga Dutt, and a retired intelligence official P S Jayaprakash.
A bench comprising Justices M R Shah and C T Ravikumar remanded the matter back to the high court and directed it to decide the issue within four weeks. "All these appeals allowed. Impugned orders granting anticipatory bail passed by HC are quashed and set aside. All matters are remitted back to the HC to be decided afresh on it own merits. This court had not observed anything on merits for either of the parties," the Bench said.
"It is ultimately for the HC to pass orders. We request the HC to decide the anticipatory bail applications at the earliest preferably within four weeks from date of this order," the Bench observed. The top court directed the registry of the high court to notify bail applications before the bench concerned within one week from today.
"Till then by way of an interim arrangement, and without prejudice to rights, it is directed that for a period of five weeks and till the bail applications are finally decided by HC on remand, the respondents may not be arrested subject to cooperation in the investigation," the apex court said.
Seeking cancellation of anticipatory bail granted to them, then CBI had said the grant of anticipatory bail might derail the investigation in the case. Earlier CBI had told the apex court that it has found in its probe that some scientists were tortured and framed in the matter due to which development of the cryogenic engine was hit and this led to India's space programme going back by almost one or two decades.
The espionage charge
CBI had said it is a "very serious matter" and there may be a larger conspiracy at the behest of foreign hands which is being investigated. The CBI had alleged that there was a clear indication that the accused were part of a team, which had ulterior motives to torpedo the attempts of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) for manufacturing the cryogenic engine.
It had registered a case against 18 persons for various offences, including criminal conspiracy, in connection with the arrest and detention of former ISRO scientist Nambi Narayanan, who was accused of spying in 1994. The case relates to allegations of transfer of certain confidential documents on India's space programme to foreign countries by two scientists and four others, including two Maldivian women.
CBI had earlier given a clean chit to Narayanan and said that the Kerala police had "fabricated" the case. The investigating agency stated that the technology ex-scientist was accused to have stolen and sold in the 1994 case did not even exist at that time and then top police officials in Kerala were responsible for his illegal arrest.
On September 14, 2018, the top court had appointed a three-member committee and directed the Kerala government to give Rs 50 lakh compensation to Narayanan for compelling him to undergo immense humiliation. Terming the police action against Narayanan as a "psycho-pathological treatment", the top court had also said that his liberty and dignity, basic to his human rights, were jeopardised as he was taken into custody and, eventually, despite all the glory of the past, was compelled to face "cynical abhorrence".
