A^HC010367152025 IN THE HIGH COURT OF ANDHRA PRADESH AT AMARAVATI THURSDAY, THE FOURTH DAY OF SEPTEMBER Oj TWO THOUSAND AND TWENTY FIVE ^ PRESENT THE HONOURABLE DR JUSTICE Y. LAKSHMANA RAO CRIMINAL PETITION NO: 7600 OF 2025 Between: V.Manjunath @ Kamsala Manjunath, Aged 35 yrs, S/o Vadia Thippanna, R/o. D.No. 2/5, Vidapanakal Mandal, Anantapur District B.C.Colony, Ramapuram, Kottala ...Petitioner/Accused No.8 AND The State of Andhra Pradesh, Rep. by its Public Prosecutor, High Court Buildings, Amaravathi ...Respondent/Complainant Petition under Section 482 of BNSS, praying that in the circumstances stated in the Memorandum of Grounds of Criminal Petition, the High Court may be pleased to grant anticipatory bail in Crime No. 10 of 2025, on the file of Vidpanakal P.S. and to release the petitioners/Accused No.8 in the event of their arrest. Counsel for the Petitioner: Sri Harish Kumar Rasineni, Advocate Counsel for the Respondent: The Public Prosecutor, High Court of A.P. The Court made the following order: #■ APHC010367152025 IN THE HIGH COURT OF ANDHRA PRADESH AT AMARAVATI (Special Original Jurisdiction) [3521] ^ * THURSDAY,THE FOURTH DAY OF SEPTEMBER TWO THOUSAND AND TWENTY FIVE PRESENT THE HONOURABLE DR JUSTICE Y. LAKSHMANA RAO CRIMINAL PETITION NO: 7600/2025 Between: V Manjunath Alias Kamsala Manjunath ...PETITIONER/ACCUSED AND The State Of Andhra Pradesh ...RESPONDENT/COMPLAINANT Counsel for the Petitioner/accused: 1.HARISH KUMAR RASINENI Counsel for the Respondent/complainant: 1. PUBLIC PROSECUTOR The Court made the following: ORDER: The Criminal Petition has been filed under Section 482 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (for brevity ‘the BNSS’) by the petitioner/Accused No.8 for granting of pre-arrest bail in connection with Crime No. 10 of 2025 of Vidapanakal Police Station, Anantapur District, registered for the alleged offences punishable under Sections 406, 409, 420, 468, 471, 120- B of Indian Penal Code (for short ‘the IPC’). 2 \ 2. The prosecution's case, in a nutshell is that on the incident to 31.03.2024 at Vidapanakal was occurred in between 01.04.2023 Ananthapuramu during 18 the implementation of MGNREGS accused are criminal mandal, round social audit on record period of 2023-24 on programme in Vidapanakal Mandal, the conspiracy together made criminal breach of trust as entrusted the work to them mi , misappropriated the amount which in Palthur, Karakamukkala was MGNREGS funds Panchayaths that they have and R.Kottala Grama usurped the scheme funds restoring fraudulent means by creating fake job cards by entering the the benami names in the existing job cards thereby siphoning off the EGS into benami accounts and also diverting wage compounent fund the housing beneficiaries wage accounts thereby cheated the payments to those benami job card holders funds for their wrongful gain. Further the accused deleted the benami from the existing job cards by misusing the login credential of PO/MPDO by them without the knowledge of MPDO/Programme names Officer. Therefore, the to the above implemented accused caused loss of Rs. 18,74,394/- programmes. 3. Mr.R.Harish Kumar, the learned counsel for the petitioner/accused has not committed No.8, submits that the petitioner falsely implicated in this any offence; he was case; he is the sole breadwinner of his family; he is 3 m 4 ready to abide any condition to be imposed by this Court; and urged to grant pre-arrest bail to the petitioner/Accused No.8. 4. Per contra, Ms. P. Akila Naidu, the learned Assistant Public Prosecutor, opposed in granting of bail stating that investigation is not yet completed; if the petitioner is granted pre-arrest bail, he will interfere in the investigation, and it is urged to dismiss the bail petition. 5. Perused the record. 6. In the F.I.R. there are specific overt acts against the petitioner/accused No.8 inasmuch as, the Mandal Parishad Development Officer in her report dated 08.02.2025 specifically attributed allegations against the petitioner that he being the Field Assistant of R.Kottala GP misappropriated the amount of Rs.54,514/-. This Court does not deem it fit to grant pre-arrest bail to the petitioner. Grant of Anticipatory bail is neither a license for the commission of an offence nor it is a shield or protection for a person against whom specific allegations are leveled, as per the decisions of the Flon’ble Apex Court in Gurbaksh Singh Sibbia v. State of Panjab^ and Sushila Aggarwal v. State of(NCT ofDelhi)^. / (1980) 2 see 565 ^2020) 5 see 1 4 7. Considering the facts and circumstances of the gravity of the allegations levelled against the petitioner, there grant of pre-arrest bail to the petitioner. Hence, the petition is liable to be dismissed. case, the nature and are no merits for 8. In the result, the Criminal Petition is dismissed. However, as per the request of the learned counsel for the petitioner, liberty is granted to the petitioner to surrender before the learned Jurisdictional Court concerned within one (01) week from the date of receipt of copy of this order, and move an appropriate application before the learned Jurisdictional Court concerned. The learned Jurisdictional Court concerned is directed to dispose of the said application in accordance with law, on its own merits by giving due and sufficient opportunity to the learned Public Prosecutor concerned, and appropriate orders within a reasonable time, as far as possible preferably in two (02) days. pass Sd/- K SRINIVASA RAJU ASSISTANT REGISTRAR //TRUE COPY// SECTION OFFICER To, 1. The Station House Officer, Vidpanakal P.S., Anantapuram District. 2. One CC to Sri Harish Kumar Rasineni, Advocate [OPUC] 3. Two CC’s to Public Prosecutor, High Court of A.P. [OUT] 4. Three CD Copies GPC sree / HIGH COURT DATED; 04/09/2025 ORDER CRLP NO. 7600 OF 2025 .-K ■- 5( 2 4 SEP 2025 c ■ Sectjop^^ DISMISSING THIS CRIMINAL PETITION