Karnataka Youth Congress leader Mohammad Harris denied bail plea in assault case

Mohammad Harris Nalapad, the Youth Congress leader of Karnataka and son of Karnataka Congress MLA NA Harris, who surrendered after 36 hours of beating up a man in Bengaluru, was denied his bail plea by a city civil and sessions court in the alleged assault case.

Nalapad, along with six others, filed his bail plea, which was rejected by the 63^rd City Civil and Sessions Court on Friday, stating that the “gravity of offences does not weigh personal liberty of the petitioner.”

Justice Parameshwar Prasanna, who denied the bail plea of the accused, said, “In case of grant of bail to the petitioner, the chances of them posing a threat to the prosecution witnesses and of his abscondence and chances of him committing similar offences cannot be ruled out. Considering the gravity and seriousness of the offences, reasonable apprehension of witnesses being tampered, this court is of the considered view that the petitioner is not entitled for bail.”

Two bail petitions were filed before the court, one by Nalapad’s representative judges, Advocate Tom Sebastian and Advocate Usman P, and the other by Advocate S Balan, who represented the six others accused in the case.

The court said, “Prima facie, it appears that the counter-complaint was filed (by co-accused Arun Babu) against Vidvat only to hamper the proben. In the larger interest of the public and state, the accused are not entitled for bail at least till the completion of investigation.”

The six accused, identified as Arun Babu, Manjunath, Mohammad Afras Ashraf, Balakrishna, Abhishek, and Nafi Mohammed Nasir, were arrested on February 17.

The advocates of Nalapad and the six others have decided to move the case to the High Court, seeking interim bail. Advocate Balan said that the whole case was being “hyped”, and that the case was just a simple drunken brawl blown out of proportion by the prosecution and the police.

Balan said, “There is no provision for Section 307 of IPC in this case. Moreover, the timing and the admission of the victim to the private hospital and the evidence provided have been doctored. The prosecution and the investigating agencies have fabricated and manipulated the case, which amounts to perjury.”

The civil and sessions court had sent all the seven accused in the case to judicial custody till March 7.

Special Public Prosecutor MS Shyamsundar said that he was happy with the court’s judgement of rejecting the bail plea, terming the whole situation as a ‘triumph of justice’. Earlier on Friday, he took to Twitter to express his concern over the judgement and feared that the accused might be free. He tweeted, “A lot of politics is involved from the beginning of the case.”

A lawyer said, “This order will definitely impact other case proceedings. If the court grants or rejects bail, this order will be considered for citing in other bail pleas, too.”

Also Read: Karnataka Youth Congress leader Mohammad Harris Nalapad surrenders after 36 hours

Senior BJP leader Lehar Singh Siroya on Friday alleged that the intense supply of drugs in Bengaluru has made the city into another ‘Udta Punjab’. He referred the city’s condition to the Bollywood movie which deals with drug abuse in Punjab.

He added that no one would have beaten a man like Vidwath was beaten, and it seemed that the attackers were under the influence of drugs. He alleged that eight high-class area around UB City, where Vidwath was beaten by Nalapad, supplied drugs to youths.

Harris Nalapad apparently was having dinner at a restaurant in the high scaled UB City mall where an injured man, named Vidwath, had placed his bandaged foot on the table of the restaurant. Nalapad asked him to remove his foot from the table and ‘sit properly’. Vidwath refused to do so which led to an argument between the two of them, and after that Nalapad and his friends started beating Vidwath, eyewitnesses said.

Vidwath was immediately rushed to the Mallya Hospital where Nalapad and his friends threatened him against filing an FIR or complaint.