New Delhi: The Supreme Court has cancelled the regular bail granted to two accused persons in a case involving the burning to death of a farmer in Satara district of Maharashtra, holding that the courts below had completely overlooked the material on record while granting them bail, and had assigned reasons that were flimsy and untenable in law.
A bench of Justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta was hearing a batch of four appeals arising out of an FIR registered at Satara Taluka Police Station for offences of murder, attempt to murder, criminal conspiracy and other offences under the Indian Penal Code. The appeals had been filed by one of the accused persons, Yash Mahesh Gaikwad, challenging rejection of his bail plea, and by the State of Maharashtra, challenging the grant of bail to three other accused persons.
According to the prosecution, the deceased, Anil Madhukar Shinde, was attacked at his residence on the night of 11 June 2024 by four men who arrived in a four wheeled vehicle demanding that his son apologise over a dispute that had occurred during the son's wedding. The FIR recorded that the main accused threatened the deceased, poured petrol on him from a can and set him ablaze after throwing a lit matchstick on his body, while the other assailants restrained him. The deceased's wife and a neighbour who rushed to help were pushed aside as the accused fled the spot.
The three accomplices, initially described as unidentified in the FIR, were later identified through a test identification parade and forensic analysis of CCTV footage and mobile phone recordings seized during investigation. One of them was found to have recorded the incident on his phone while it was taking place.
The trial court at Satara had granted bail to one accused on the ground of parity with two others already granted bail by the Bombay High Court's Kolhapur bench. The High Court, while granting bail to one of those two, reasoned that he had merely recorded the incident and had not participated in the act, and that he was a nineteen year old student with no prior antecedents. Bail was also granted to the accused's father on the finding that he was not present at the scene and that the allegation of supplying petrol from his motorcycle rested on circumstantial evidence. Separately, the High Court had declined bail to Yash Gaikwad, holding that his role as driver and lookout, who ferried the other accused to the scene and back with inflammable material, prima facie showed a common intention to commit the offence.
The State and the complainant argued that the accused had been identified through cogent evidence, including the identification parade and video recordings, and that the reasoning given for granting bail did not reflect real application of mind to the gravity of the allegations. Counsel for the accused contended that the FIR had not attributed any specific overt act to them individually and that they were young men unaware that the main accused intended to set the deceased on fire.
The Court held that the FIR and the material on record showed that the accused had launched a sustained and pre planned offensive on the deceased's house, arriving together with a can of petrol and threatening the family well before the attack took place. It observed that this conduct, viewed cumulatively, prima facie indicated that the assailants were acting in concert and shared a common intention to cause harm.
The Court also reiterated that an order granting bail in a serious offence must reflect proper application of mind, observing that “any order devoid of such reasons would suffer from non application of mind.”
Setting aside the High Court's order granting bail to the accused who had recorded the incident, and the trial court's order extending parity to his co-accused, the Supreme Court cancelled their bail and directed them to surrender within three weeks, failing which the trial court was to secure their arrest. The Court, however, declined to interfere with the bail granted to the accused's father, noting that he had admittedly not been present at the scene when the deceased was set on fire and that the case against him rested on circumstantial evidence. The appeal filed by Yash Gaikwad against denial of bail to him was also dismissed.
The Court clarified that its observations were confined to the question of bail and would not influence the trial court's independent adjudication of the case on merits, and directed that the trial be completed within two years.
Case Title: Yash Mahesh Gaikwad v. State of Maharashtra and Anr., with connected appeals arising out of SLP(Crl.) Nos. 6992, 11037, 11038 and 11039 of 2026
