Jagatsinghpur: A day after the Supreme Court set aside the bail of Industrialist and Orissa Stevedores Limited (OSL) managing director Mahimananda Mishra aka Mahima Mishra, who was out on bail granted by the Orissa High Court, surrendered before the court of JMFC, Kujang in Jagatsinghpur district Wednesday.
He was then remanded in Samagol jail here, report said.
Mishra’s surrender comes a day after the Supreme Court junked the bail granted to him by the Orissa High Court. The Odisha government had moved the apex court seeking scrapping of the bail granted to Mishra by the lower court.
“Having regard to the totality of the facts and circumstances of the case, the impugned judgment of the High Court granting an order of bail in favour of respondent Mahimananda Mishra herein is liable to be set aside. The respondent be taken into custody forthwith,” the Supreme Court had said.
A two-judge bench comprising Justice L Nageswara Rao and Justice Mohan M Shantanagoudar Tuesday allowed the application of the state government opposing the bail granted to Mishra, and directed the government to take him into custody.
Delivering the judgement the bench observed, “Since the respondent is an influential person in his locality with both money and muscle power there is a reasonable apprehension that he might tamper with or otherwise sabotage the investigation which is still going on, and might intimidate witnesses before or during the trial.”
“The High Court, in observing that there was no possibility of the respondent absconding as he is a local businessman, not only completely overlooked his past attempts to evade the law, but also overlooked the implications of the clout enjoyed by him in society,” the SC bench observed.
The bench apparently said the High Court has not exercised discretion judiciously and in accordance with the basic principles governing bail.
“Considering the totality of facts and the circumstances of the case and for reasons mentioned above, the judgement of the High Court granting bail to the respondent is set aside. The respondent, Mahimananda Mishra, should be taken into custody,” the bench observed.
According to the police, Mishra had hired two contractor killers who had hurled explosives at the vehicle of Mahendra Swain, branch manager of Seaways Shipping and Logistics Limited October 26, 2016 and when the passengers of the vehicle tried to escape the assailants opened fire killing them. The incident was mainly due to the business rivalry between the company of the deceased and Mishra’s company.
Mishra fled the country after the murder of Swain and after a lookout circular was issued he was traced to Thailand and was deported to India. He was arrested after arrival in India.
Notably, the High Court had on July 16 granted Mishra conditional bail in two cases. The bail was granted in connection with Press Chhak bomb hurling and Paradeep Tarinigada firing cases against two sureties of Rs 1 lakh each.
PNN