The Supreme Court on Friday granted bail to a person who along with Rajendra Bihari Lal, the vice chancellor of Uttar Pradesh’s Sam Higginbottom University of Agriculture, Technology and Sciences (SHUATS), was facing probe in a criminal case pertaining to alleged illegal religious conversions.
A bench comprising Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and justices JB Pardiwala and Manoj Misra fixed the bail bond amount for accused Ram Sewak, a resident of Indore in Madhya Pradesh, saying that it should not be in excess of Rs 25,000.
The top court said the other bail conditions will be fixed by the trial court. We direct that the petitioner shall be released on bail in connection with … lodged at Police Station Nawabganj, District Ganganagar (Commissionerate Prayagraj), Uttar Pradesh subject to such terms and conditions as may be imposed by the Trial Judge. “However, the quantum of the bail bond to be fixed shall not be in excess of Rs 25,000, the bench said.
On April 1, the top court had granted bail to Rajendra Bihari Lal in two criminal cases pertaining to offences including that of alleged illegal religious conversions. The court also issued notice to the Uttar Pradesh government on Ram Sewak’s plea for quashing the case against him.
The cases against Lal and Ram Sewak involve offences under sections 307 (attempt to murder), 504 (intentional insult with an aim to provoke breach of peace) and 386 (extortion) of the IPC. They were also booked under some provisions of the Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act, 2021.
The Uttar Pradesh Police had earlier told the top court that Lal and other accused are the main perpetrators of a mass religious conversion programme which involves foreign funds from about 20 countries.
The police had said Lal, among the other accused in the case, was actually a notorious criminal involved in 38 cases of various nature, including cheating and murder, registered across the state over the last two decades.
The state police have alleged that about 90 Hindus congregated at the Evangelical Church of India in Hariharganj, Fatehpur, for converting to Christianity and were put under undue influence, coercion, and lured through fraud and the promise of easy money.
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