SC committee recommends cancellation of bail granted to Ashish Mishra

|HT|

A Supreme Court-appointed committee monitoring the Lakhimpur Kheri violence case has recommended the cancellation of bail granted to union minister Ajay Mishra’s son Ashish Mishra, the apex court told the Uttar Pradesh government on Wednesday. Hearing the plea seeking cancellation of bail granted to the prime accused in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence, the court asked the UP government to make its stand clear on challenging Mishra's bail by Monday. "There are two letters sent by the SIT to the Additional chief secretary (home) of the Uttar Pradesh government by the monitoring judge who had written to state to file appeal in SC to cancel bail of main accused Ashish Mishra," the bench headed by Chief Justice N V Ramana said.

The victims' families have already opposed the bail.

Senior advocate Mahesh Jethmalani, appearing for the state government, informed the court that the Additional Secretary, Home, has stated that he did not receive the letters.

The bench then asked Jethmalani to go through the reports submitted by the SIT, seeking the state’s response by April 4.

On Tuesday, the state government submitted to the Supreme Court that it had "vehemently opposed" the bail application of Ashish Mishra, refuting the allegations has it had not effectively opposed the bail plea. It also submitted that a decision to challenge the bail order by the Allahabad High Court is pending before the relevant authorities for consideration. Referring to the bail order and the counter affidavit, the government said in its submission that “[t]he same clearly demonstrates that the Respondent No.1 (Ashish Mishra) Bail application was vehemently opposed by the State, and any averments to the contrary in the SLP(filed by the family members against HC order) are completely false and merit to be rejected."

Referring to the UP government's submission, senior advocate Dushyant Dave, appearing for the petitioners, submitted that "it is imminent that the bail be cancelled or set aside in these circumstances as the HC verdict suffers from non-application of mind."

In October 2021, protesting farmers in Lakhimpur Kheri were mowed down by a convoy of vehicles which included Ashish Mishra’s SUV. Four farmers were killed by a speeding SUV owned by Mishra, following which the driver and two BJP workers were allegedly lynched by angry farmers.

(Except for the headline and the pictorial description, this story has not been edited by THE DEN staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)