The High Court
Case Details
IN THE HIGH COURT OF ORISSA AT CUTTACK BLAPL NO.3135 of 2025 (In the matter of application under Section 483 of BNSS, 2023). Gautam Kundu … Petitioner -versus- Union of India (CBI) … Opposite Party For Petitioner : Mr. R. Lochan, Advocate For Opposite Party : Mr. S. Nayak, Advocate (CBI) CORAM: JUSTICE G. SATAPATHY DATE OF HEARING :22.07.2025 DATE OF JUDGMENT:31.07.2025 G. Satapathy, J. 1. This is a bail application U/S.483 of BNSS by the petitioner for grant of bail in connection with SPE Case No.34 of 2014 corresponding to TR Case No.4 of 2017 (CBI/SCB/SIT/Kolkata Case No.RC.39(S) of 2014) pending in the file of learned Additional Special Judge (CBI-1), Bhubaneswar, for commission of offences punishable U/Ss.420/408/409/120-B/34 of IPC r/w BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 1 of 15 Sections 4/5/6 of Prize Chits & Money Circulation Schemes (Banning) Act, 1978 (in short, “the Act”). 2. The brief facts and allegation against the petitioner in precise are that on the report of affected investors, initially three cases were registered against the Rose Valley Hotels and Entertainments Ltd. arraying its Managing Directors & two other employees vide Buguda PS Case No.75 of 2013 U/Ss.420/34 of IPC and Sections 4/5/6 of the Act; Nuapada PS Case No.82 of 2013 U/Ss.420/120-B of IPC and Sections 4/5/6 of the Act and Jeypore Town PS Case No.71 of 2013 U/Ss.408/409/420 of IPC and Sections 4/5/6 of the Act, but basing on the direction of the Apex Court passed in W.P.(C) No.401 of 2013, 44 cases were registered by the CBI/SCB/SIT/Kolkata in respect of different companies collecting money from the public in Odisha and, accordingly, the CBI took up the investigation consolidating the aforesaid three PS Cases in Odisha by registering a case vide RC.39(S)/2014-Kol on 05.06.2014 for commission of offences U/Ss.420/ 408/ BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 2 of 15 409/ 120-B/ 34 of IPC and Sections 4/5/6 of the Act. The allegation against the petitioner is that he being the Chairman of Rose Valley Group of Companies had collected huge sum of money to the tune of around Rs.17,378 Crores from the general public and gullible investors falsely assuring them of high returns, but such collection of investment was without any authorization either from RBI or SEBI and later on, he did not fulfill the assurance given to the investors by refunding their dues invested in camouflage schemes. It is also alleged that the petitioner and his Group of Company had taken investment from around Rs.32 Lakhs depositors, but later duped them by not paying their dues. 3.
Legal Reasoning
Heard, Mr. Rajeev Lochan, learned counsel for the petitioner and Mr. Sarthak Nayak, learned counsel for the CBI and perused the record. 3.1. The main thrust of argument for the petitioner are that bail is the rule, but jail is the exception; long custody of the petitioner awaiting trial; BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 3 of 15 suffering of the petitioner from critical illness; no offence U/S.409 of IPC is made out against the petitioner and the petitioner has already undergone the maximum sentence for the rest of the offences; trial would take considerable time as there are 400 witnesses required to be examined in this case; and last but not the least, the value of the property of the petitioner attached exceeds his liability and, thereby, the investors can be compensated by selling out the property attached, in case the petitioner is found convicted. 3.2. In reply, it is advanced for the CBI that the petitioner has not approached this Court with clean hands and he has suppressed many things and the delay is only attributable to the petitioner and the plea for bail of the petitioner has been turned down by the Apex Court in limine and the petitioner has got an outstanding amount of Rs.9,000 Crores to be refunded to the investors and the petitioner has got a long checkered history of criminal cases of similar nature, so BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 4 of 15 also he poses flight risk and all the principal accused are still in custody. 4. After having considered the rival submissions upon perusal of record, it appears that the petitioner was the Chairman/Director of the Rose Valley Group of Companies and he was alleged to have collected money illegally from the general public through co-accused persons on false assurance of high returns, but such collection of investment was without having any authorization from regulatory authority to run this type of business. There also appears allegation against the accused persons and others for doing this kind of illegal activity as a part of large criminal conspiracy. It is also alleged that the Rose Valley Group of Companies was not having any approval of either RBI or SEBI. It is also alleged that the petitioner and others including the Board of Directors and employees of Rose Valley Group of Companies have collected more than Rs.17,000 Crores from gullible investors across the country on the assurance of high returns, but only BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 5 of 15 could clear up some amount, however, still the company is yet to refund more than Rs.9,000 Crores as alleged. It is also alleged by the CBI that the petitioner was the Director of at least 25 Companies of Rose Valley Group, which collected money illegally from the general public. 5. In the course of hearing, it is undoubtedly argued on behalf of the petitioner that bail is the rule, but jail is the exception and long custody of the petitioner awaiting trial is certainly a ground to grant bail, but these principles are definitely the golden principles governing the field of bail jurisprudence, however, such principles may be available to those persons/litigants who approaches the Courts with clean hands. This Court, however, in this bail application has found that the petitioner to have not disclosed his antecedents as well as to have suppressed some facts with regard to his approaching this Court and Apex Court on earlier occasions and such conduct of the petitioner is not acceptable for reason more than one; BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 6 of 15 firstly, the petitioner in his bail application has deviated from the direction issued by the Apex Court in Kusha Duruka Vrs. State of Odisha; (2024) 4 SCC 432 by mandatorily not reflecting as to how many times he had approached this Court, so also the Apex Court and the petitioner has only stated in this bail application “the matter out of which this bail application arises was before this Court in BLAPL No.10913 of 2024 disposed of on 24.12.2024”, but the petitioner has earlier approached this Court in BLAPL No.7389 of 2023
Decision
disposed of on 21.08.2024. 6. Again, the petitioner had also approached this Court in BLAPL No.10913 of 2024 and this Court by a reasoned order rejected the aforesaid bail application on 24.12.2024, but undeterred by the rejection of his bail, the petitioner carried an appeal vide Special Leave to Appeal (Crl.) No.1536 of 2025, wherein the Apex Court while dismissing the application of the petitioner on 03.02.2025 has observed as under:- “1. Having heard learned senior counsel for the petitioner, we are not satisfied that it is BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 7 of 15 a fit case to exercise our discretion under Articles 136 of the Constitution of India. 2. The present petition is, accordingly, dismissed. 3. Pending application(s), if any, shall stand disposed of.” 7. The irony in this case is that the petitioner has neither stated in his bail application the details of the bail application filed by him earlier, such as in BLAPL No.7389 of 2023 nor the fact of his approaching the Apex Court in above Special Leave to Appeal (Crl.); although there is a standing order of High Court in Orissa pursuant to direction of Apex Court in Kusha Duruka Vrs. State of Odisha; (2024) 4 SCC 432 to mention about the details of orders passed in earlier bail application. The relevant conclusions recorded by Apex Court in Kusha Duruka (supra) are hereby extracted as under:- future “22. In our opinion, to avoid any confusion in to mandatorily mention in the application(s) filed for grant of bail: it would be appropriate 22.1. Details and copies of order(s) passed in the earlier bail application(s) filed by the petitioner which have been already decided. BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 8 of 15 22.2. Details of any bail application(s) filed by the petitioner, which is pending either in any court, below the court in question or the higher court, and if none is pending, a clear statement to that effect has to be made. 22.2.1. Xxx xxx xxx 22.2.2. In case it is mentioned on the top of the bail application or any other place which is clearly visible, that the application for bail is either first, second or third and so on, so that it is convenient for the court to appreciate the arguments in that light. If this fact is mentioned in the order, it will enable the next higher court to appreciate the arguments in that light.” 8. Besides, it is not disputed that the petitioner is having a long history of criminal cases of similar nature, but not a single antecedent of the petitioner has been mentioned in his bail application. In this context, this Court considers it profitable to refer to the very recent decision of Apex Court in Kaushal Singh Vrs. State of Rajasthan; 2025 INSC 871, wherein it has been held in paragraphs-22 and 23 as under:- “22. Before parting, we would like to state that, accounting for the criminal antecedents of the accused while considering the bail applications has been the subject matter of BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 9 of 15 concern for Courts across the country. The rules and orders of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, to be specific, Rule 5 of Chapter 1-A(b) Volume-V specifically provide as below: “5. Bail applications. - In every application for bail presented to the High Court the petitioner shall state whether similar application has or has not been made to the Supreme Court, and if made shall state the result thereof. The petitioner/applicant shall also mention whether he/she is/was involved in any other criminal case or not. If yes, particulars and decisions thereof. An application which does not contain this information shall be placed before the bench with the necessary information.” 23. We feel that every High Court in the incorporating a country should consider similar provision in the respective High Court Rules and/or Criminal Side Rules as it would impose an obligation on the accused to make disclosures regarding his/her involvement in any other case(s) previously registered.” criminal 9. The above discussion is significant not only because the petitioner knew all these facts, but also has not reflected in his bail application and albeit it was brought in the course of argument to the notice of the learned counsel for the petitioner who preferred not to bring these facts by way of additional BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 10 of 15 averments/affidavit. This Court, therefore, considers that the petitioner is guilty of suppression of relevant facts. It specifically asked to learned counsel for the petitioner as to what are the changes in circumstances after rejection of bail of the petitioner by Apex Court on 03.02.2025, but he could not give any reasonable explanation. The ultimate argument canvassed for the petitioner is “Bail is the Rule, but Jail is the exception”, but such argument becomes insignificant because the allegation against the petitioner is not only the magnitude of cheating and misappropriation to the tune around Rs.9000 Crores, but also cheating lakhs of gullible depositors/investors, which may include small investors or small businessmen and who were men of lower echelons of the society and it may so happen, if such persons are cheated of their entire life savings, it may run the risk of forcing such persons to commit crime or losing life since it is not uncommon in our society that some people commit suicide due to extreme poverty and, therefore, the allegations leveled against the petitioner need to be looked in a different BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 11 of 15 perspective and the petitioner cannot be extended the benefit of bail inasmuch as the case of the petitioner puts him in the category of exception to the rule of bail, especially when the allegations relegate him to a harsh situation. 10. One of the argument advanced for the petitioner is that since the petitioner is neither a public servant nor a banker, the offence U/S.409 of IPC is not made out, but the ingredients of Section 409 of IPC not only include public servant or banker within its domain, but also include in the way of business as a banker, merchant, factor, broker, attorney or agents committing criminal breach of trust in respect of the property and in this case, the allegation against the petitioner is that he in the capacity of Chairman of a group of finance companies has unauthorizedly collected thousands of Crores of rupees from lakhs of investors on the assurance of giving high returns and it is too early to say that the uncontroverted allegations does not disclose the ingredients of Section 409 of IPC. The decision relied on by the petitioner in N. BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 12 of 15 Raghavender Vrs. State of Andhra Pradesh Vrs. CBI; (2021) 18 SCC 70 may be found distinguishable from the facts of the case inasmuch as the relied decision is rendered in an appeal against conviction, but the petitioner is yet to face the trial. Further, all the contention which the petitioner has advanced in this bail application were earlier available to him, but his bail applications were earlier not only rejected by this Court, but also by the Apex Court in the Special Leave to Appeal (Crl.) just few months back and this Court does not consider it prudent to accept such plea of the petitioner at this stage. 11. The petitioner has taken another plea of “delay in trial” as a ground to grant bail to him, but CBI refutes such submission by contending inter-alia that the petitioner is guilty of delay. Be that as it may, the Apex Court in State of Bihar and another Vrs. Amit Kumar @ Bachcha Rai; (2017) 13 SCC 751 has held in paragraph-8 as under:- “8. Xxx xxx xxx When the seriousness of the offence is such the mere fact that he was BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 13 of 15 in jail for however long time should not be the concern of the courts. We are not able to appreciate such a casual approach while granting bail in a case which has the effect of undermining the trust of people in the integrity of the education system in the State of Bihar.” Besides, time and again, it is reiterated that while granting bail, the Court has to keep in mind the nature of accusations, the nature of evidence in support thereof, the character of the accused, circumstance which are peculiar to the accused and the larger interest of the public/States and other similar considerations etc. Economic offences constitute a class apart and need to be visited with different approach in the matter of bail. The economic offence having deep rooted conspiracy and involving huge loss of public funds needs to be viewed seriously and considered as a grave offence affecting the economy of the Country as a whole and thereby posing serious threat in the financial health of the Country[Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy Vrs. CBI; (2013) 7 SCC 439 and Nimmagadda Prasad Vrs. CBI; (2013) 7 SCC 466] BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 14 of 15 12. In view of the discussions made hereinabove and taking into account the nature, gravity and magnitude of the allegation coupled with the quantum of amount involved in this case and the number of investors cheated by the camouflage schemes floated by the Rose Valley of Group of Company in active alleged involvement of the petitioner, this Court does not consider it proper to grant bail to him. 13. In the result, the bail application being devoid of merit stands dismissed on contest, but in the circumstance there is no order as to costs. (G. Satapathy) Judge Signature Not Verified Digitally Signed Signed by: SUBHASMITA DAS Designation: Sr. Stenographer Reason: Authentication Location: High Court of Orissa Date: 31-Jul-2025 14:26:04 Orissa High Court, Cuttack, Dated the 31st day of July, 2025/Subhasmita BLAPL No.3135 of 2025 Page 15 of 15