[2025:RJ-JP:38846] HIGH COURT OF JUDICATURE FOR RAJASTHAN BENCH AT JAIPUR S.B. Criminal Miscellaneous Bail Application No. 1796/2025 Ranveer Singh S/o Late Shri Mahendra Singh, Aged About 53 Years, R/o S-23-24, Gali No. 9, Nityanand Nagar, Gandhi Path, Queens Road, Police Station Vaishali Nagar, Jaipur. (At Present Confined In Central Jail Jaipur). ----Petitioner Versus State Of Rajasthan, Through PP ----Respondent For Petitioner(s) : Mr. Swadeep Singh Hora with Mr. Sahaj Veer Bawaja Mr. Himanshu Agrawal Ms. Varuni Agarwal For Respondent(s) : Mr. V.R. Bajwa, Sr. Adv. with Ms. Savita Nathawat Mr. Sandeep Luhadia Mr. Manish Gagarani Mr. Vijay Singh Yadav, PP Ms. Arti Sarma, PP HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE ASHOK KUMAR JAIN Order 16/09/2025 1. The present bail application under Section 483 of BNSS is filed by the applicant-accused Ranveer Singh S/o Late Shri Mahendra Singh, seeking bail in respect of a criminal case registered as FIR No.65/2024 dated 20.02.2024 registered at P.S. Sadar Jaipur, District - Jaipur (West), for the offence under Sections 420, 406, 467, 468, 471 and 120-B of IPC. 2. Learned counsel for the applicant submitted that the applicant has been falsely implicated in the matter and the investigation against him is complete and he is no more required in investigation. He further submitted that there are [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (2 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] no chance of fleeing of applicant accused from the jurisdiction of this Hon’ble Court. The applicant does not have any criminal antecedents. He also submitted that the applicant undertakes not to repeat offence and cooperate with investigation/trial, which will take time. 3. Learned counsel for the petitioner while relying upon statement of several witnesses recorded during investigation by the Investigating Officer has submitted that the present petitioner is a poor employee of the Bar Association, Jaipur and under the instructions of the President and Secretary, he worked and maintained the accounts. He further submits that the Investigating Officer has recorded statement of Dharamveer, Rameshwar Lal, Kailash, Pravin Kumar, Hariom, Shankar Lal, Sher Singh, Ashwani Kumar Mishra, Jagdish and submitted that current report is registered to settle scores between leaders’ of lawyers’ Association. He further referred forensic audit report as prepared during investigation and submitted that the discrepancies in the audit report clearly point out same is prepared on basis of estimation, and actual loss has not been assessed by the Auditor. He further submitted that the accounts books and vouchers were not audited by the auditor and the report is not based on record of the Bar Association. He further referred the receipts collected by the Investigating Officer and submitted that these receipts were issued under the directions of the then President and same were not prepared by present petitioner. He submitted that it is impossible for a [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (3 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] poor employee to siphon of any amount and/or commit misappropriation of money from accounts of the Bar Association. He raised issue about process of election of the Bar Association and submitted that just before the election hundreds of such receipts to show deposition of membership fee were issued at the instance of office barers of Association but actually the Members have not deposited the money. He further submitted that he raised objections to the draft audit report prepared by Mathur and Company and all these were ignored by the Investigating Officer. He also submitted that current charge-sheet is filed only under the pressure of Bar Association as except oral allegations, no material evidence is available on record to show involvement of present petitioner. 4. Learned counsel has further referred statement of Pawan Sharma, Ram Kumar Sharma, Gajender Singh, Arun Kumawat, Rishiraj Singh, Nawal Kishore Sharma, Manish Pareek and submitted that all these have just recorded stereo type statement and except the oral allegations, there is nothing is available on record to substantiate their allegations. He also referred working and methodology of Ashok Kumar Sain who was operating the accounts and computer as part time and submitted that he was well aware about the actual deposition of money, particularly collection during election period. He further submitted that when there is no actual transaction of cash amount and receipts were issued without receiving actual cash and present petitioner is [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (4 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] not responsible for loss of any money. He further referred the statement of Jagdish, who is owner of tea shop and submitted that he actually did not paid any amount but still the report states that petitioner has colleted the money. He also referred statement of other employees of the Bar Association and submitted that at any point of time, during last 5-7 years, not a single whisper was raised against the present petitioner and it is impossible for a poor employee to misappropriate money to the tune of few crores. He referred the material collected by police during investigation and submitted that there is neither any recovery nor any evidence of entrustment of money to show that the present petitioner has committed offence of cheating. He referred the judgment in Delhi Race Club (1940) Ltd. & Ors. vs. State of Uttar Pradesh & Anr., 2024 INSC 626, and submitted that in order to constitute the offence of cheating, there should be entrustment and dishonest intention, however, in the present case, no such fraudulent or dishonest intention is evident from the evidence collected by the Investigating Officer. 5. Learned counsel has further submitted that the allegations of printing fake and duplicate receipt book were also mentioned against the present petitioner but it has not been established that under what authority the receipt book was printed and when and how duplicate receipt book has been used by the present petitioner. He also submitted that the doubts raised by complainant are not sufficient to point out finger about [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (5 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] involvement of present petitioner. He also submitted that when evidence of cheating, forgery and fabrication of documents is not available, then present petitioner cannot be detained unnecessarily for an offence triable by Magistrate First Class. He also referred triple test as laid down by Hon’ble Supreme Court in case of P. Chidhambaram Vs. Central Bureau of Investigation : Criminal Appeal No.1603/2019 and submitted that the present petitioner is entitled to be released on bail. 6. Learned counsel has further referred the shoddy investigation and submitted that without collecting any evidence, present petitioner was arrested and forwarded to face the trial, which will take time. He also submitted that present petitioner has neither involved in any politics of Bar Association nor was he part of cash collection but due to animosity between two rival leaders of the Association, present petitioner was implicated as an accused. He further referred the practice of audit adopted by the Bar Association and submitted that the Investigating Officer has neither collected annual audit reports of Bar Association, supposed to be approved by general house nor he investigated role and involvement of persons in-charge of affairs (executive body of the Bar Association). He also submitted that at the most an offence of 408 of IPC is prima facie made out and the petitioner is entitled for bail. [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (6 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] 7. Learned Public Prosecutor has vehemently opposed the bail application and submitted that the allegations are grave and serious in nature. 8. Learned Senior Advocate appearing for the complainant the Bar Association has seriously opposed the arguments advanced by learned counsel for the petitioner and specifically referred the allegations made in the complaint and submitted that the issue came to light when after death of some members, who were issued fake receipts during their lifetime, a claim is raised and on verification, it was found that neither is there any record of membership nor record of deposition of membership fee. He further submitted that on an enquiry, the Association came to know about issuance of forged and duplicate receipt to some of demised member(s) during their lifetime after collecting money from them. He submitted that after every election when a new Executive takes the charge the duties lies upon the employees of the Association to bring the fact of non- deposition of money to the notice of newly elected Executive and same can be resolved by collecting the money or whatever method adopted by the executive body. He also referred the allegations supported by the witnesses recorded by the Investigating Officer and submitted that the allegations were fully proved against the petitioner-accused who is in-charge of entire accounts of the Bar Association which has around 15 to 19 thousand Members. He further referred letter dated 20.02.2024 submitted by the present [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (7 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] petitioner and submitted that the present petitioner has proposed to deposit ₹25 lacs so as to close the matter. He referred the intention of present petitioner and submitted that if he has not siphoned of or committed breach of trust then why he agreed to deposit a huge amount of ₹25,00,000/- to the Bar Association to close the enquiry against him. He also referred a report of the Committee constituted by the executive and submitted that the Committee has also found that fake and duplicate receipts and tickets were issued and money was not deposited after collection from the Members of the Bar Association. He further submits that only because of gravity of matter and interest of 15000 lawyers, the investigation is transferred to SOG. He also referred the statement of Ashok Kumar, Neeraj Kumar, Dharamveer and submitted that the present petitioner was in-charge of the affairs of Bar Association and he is head of accounts, who was entrusted with financial responsibility by the Bar Association. He accepted that annual audit reports were not filed on record but candidly admits in presence of the President and Secretary of the Bar Association, that they will take this issue to the General House for annual audit of the accounts of Bar Association if directed by this Hon’ble Court. He also referred the material collected by the Investigating Officer and submitted that the role and involvement of present petitioner is pointed out in final report therefore, he is not entitled to be released on bail. [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (8 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] 9. The Investigating Officer is also present before this Court and he candidly admitted that despite his efforts no recovery is made from present petitioner as he is not having any money either in his account or in form of any property. He admitted that the present petitioner is a poor person and during investigation he did not found any evidence purchase of any property from crime proceed in his name or in the name of his family member. 10. Heard learned counsel for the petitioner-accused, learned Public Prosecutor and learned Senior Advocate appearing on behalf of complainant. Also heard Investigating Officer, who is personally present before this Court. Also considered the judgments as referred during course of arguments. Perused the material placed on record by both the parties. 11. The brief and relevant facts are that a complaint is filed by Pawan Sharma, the then President and Raj Kumar Sharma, the then General Secretary of the Bar Association, Jaipur about misappropriation in the funds of the Bar Association, kept by Ranveer Singh (present petitioner). It is further alleged that duplicate receipt books and tickets were also used to collect funds. On basis of said report, FIR was registered at PS Sadar, Jaipur, District Jaipur (West) on 20.02.2024. The investigation is transferred to the SOG and after investigation, SOG has filed a charge-sheet against the present petitioner Ranveer Singh for offence under Sections 420, 406, 467, 468 and 471 of IPC. The conclusion drawn by [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (9 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] the Investigating Officer also indicate that it has inquired the role of Nawal Kishore Sharma, Anil, Manoj Kumar Sharma and others but neither any role and involvement nor abetement on their part is found proved. The list of witnesses enclosed with charge-sheet clearly indicate that 47 witnesses were named by police at the time of filing of charge-sheet. 12. A perusal of statement of Pawan Sharma, Rajkumar Sharma, Gajendra Singh Naruka, Arun Kumawat, Rishiraj Singh, Nawal Kishore Sharma, Manish Pareek recorded under Section 161 CrPC indicate that they fully corroborated the allegation against the present petitioner. The statement of Ashok Kumar Sain also indicate that he was also involved in accounting process and on previous occasion, he has not raised the issue to any previous Executive body about present petitioner. The statement of employees of Bar Association such as Dharamveer, Rameshwarlal, Kailash, Triveni Kumar, Hariom, were also recorded by the Investigating Officer. Besides aforesaid statement of Mukesh Kumar, Shankar Lal, Sher Singh, Ashwini Kumar, Pravin Kumar, Omprakash, Kishanchand, Surendra Kumar, Nitin Kumar, Jai Kumar, Banwarilal, Vijay Prakash, Jagdish and Mohan Lal were also recorded by the Investigating Officer who in fact deposited licence fee to the Bar Association. 13. The Investigating Officer also recorded statement of lawyers Niraj Kumar, Bhagchand, Dron Kumar, Lokesh Singh, Satish [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (10 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] Sharma and Sanjay Sharma and we have considered their statement in relation to role and involvement of present petitioner. The statement of Vinay Bansal, who is Auditor and appointed on instruction of SP, ATS has conducted forensic audit after segregating details of different years though serious objections were raised about the findings recorded n the audit report and at this stage we do not want to express our opinion as it is a call to be taken by the trial Court to decide role and involvement of the present petitioner. 14. It is also evident on record that Mr. Pawan Sharma and Rajkumar Sharma were elected on 09.12.2023 but prior to them there were many Presidents and Secretaries since 2016. If financial irregularities and financial mismanagement is going on since 2016, then a call is required to be taken by the General House of the Bar Association, so that rivalry between leaders of lawyers may not result into a dirty game of settling scores. The statement of Investigating Officer before the Court indicated that during investigation he did not found any property in possession of the present petitioner including cash amount. His statement clearly indicate that the present petitioner has not diverted money to anyone then the question before us is whether the money is actually siphoned of, or whether it is misappropriated, by the petitioner. A question is raised about mass scale financial mismanagement. [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (11 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] 15. During course of arguments, learned counsel appearing for the petitioner and learned Senior Advocate appearing for the complainant (the Bar Association) have candidly admitted that these issues pertain to sentiment of 15000 to 19000 lawyers who are Members of the Bar Association and they have in deposited money to the Bar Association. The material available on record only pointed out that the present petitioner was involved in managing the account of the Bar Association. Therefore, his role and involvement as pointed out by the complainant at the time of filing of complaint and verified by the Investigating Officer is at last sufficient for trial of the case. The only question is how much money was in fact collected by the Bar Association during said period and how many receipts were issued to the persons from whom collection was made. Similarly, whether this money in fact deposited in the account of Bar Association or same was misappropriated, and by whom. The money which was collected was in fact used for unaccounted expenditure or really misappropriated by the petitioner or by anybody else. 16. The petitioner accused has offered to deposit ₹25,00,000/- to settle the dispute and same is one of the circumstance against the petitioner as pointed out by learned Senior Advocate for the complainant. The material on record is sufficient to draw a conclusion that the accounts in the Bar Association, Jaipur at the time of registration of case were not properly managed and it has given room and scope for [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (12 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] misappropriation of funds or incurring expenditure in uncontrollable and unaccountable manner. Considering the role and involvement of the present petitioner, it is very serious offence. 17. The Supreme Court in the case of Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy v. CBI (2013) 7 SCC 439 held that economic offences constitute a class apart, having deep rooted conspiracies and huge loss of public funds. These must be viewed with greater seriousness. 18. In the case of P. Chidambaram v. Directorate of Enforcement (2019) 9 SCC 24 the Supreme Court held that a decision on bail must factor in the gravity, magnitude and societal impact of economic offences. The Supreme Court noted that:- “24. Economic offences stand as a different class as they affect the economic fabric of the society. The magnitude of the offence committed, the enormity of the allegations levelled and the seriousness of the charges levelled against the accused are relevant considerations while examining the question of grant of bail. The court has to keep in mind the position of the accused, the nature of the accusation, the nature of evidence in support thereof and the reasonable apprehension of tampering with witnesses or apprehension of threat to the complainant.” 19. In the case of Nimmagadda Prasad v. CBI (2013) 7 SCC 466 the Supreme Court held that bail in economic offences cannot be granted lightly considering the magnitude of financial irregularities. The Supreme court noted that:- “23. Economic offences constitute a class apart and need to be visited with a different approach in the [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (13 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] matter of bail. The economic offence having deep- rooted conspiracies and involving huge loss of public funds needs to be viewed seriously and considered as grave offences affecting the economy of the country as a whole and thereby posing serious threat to the financial health of the country.” 20. The Supreme Court in the case of State of Bihar v. Amit Kumar (2017) 13 SCC 751 held that the principle of “bail not jail” is not an absolute and economic offences are to be treated as a class apart. The Supreme Court held that:- “12. While granting bail, the court has to keep in mind the nature of accusation, the nature of evidence in support thereof, the severity of the punishment, the character of the accused, reasonable apprehension of tampering with the witnesses and prima facie satisfaction of the court in support of the charge. In cases of economic offences, which involve deep-rooted conspiracies and huge loss of public funds, the duty of the court is even more onerous and such cases are required to be dealt with a different approach in the matter of bail.” 21. Looking at the prevailing legal position in reference to economic offences it is clear that economic offences constitute a class apart, having deep rooted conspiracies and huge loss of funds. These must be viewed with greater seriousness. Granting bail in such cases has to be done very carefully and the court has to keep in mind that bail cannot be granted lightly. 22. Having considered the audit report, which I also feel that same requires consideration by the Bar Association wherein misappropriation to the tune of ₹3.42 crore is alleged against the present petitioner and looking to the magnitude of financial loss and larger interest of lawyers this Court is [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (14 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] not inclined to grant bail at this stage to the present petitioner. 23. The facts and the material indicate that the alleged offence are of serious nature and role attributed to applicant is prima facie sufficient to consider complicity of applicant in the crime. Therefore, at this juncture, considering the evidence collected so far, this is not a fit case to enlarge the applicant accused on bail. 24. It is need of the hour for the Bar Association, Jaipur to take appropriate action and measures to prevent financial irregularities and misappropriations by implementing a robust mechanism by enforcing strict discipline for maintaining accounts. During course of arguments, it has been brought to the notice of the Court that everyday cash money is generated from everyday sale of welfare stamps, vakalatnama(s) and other articles, such as file cover etc. Similarly, annual fee and lifetime subscriptions were also collected along with monthly rent and licence fee from the vendors. Considering collection of funds from individuals, it is necessary to adopt digital mechanism in accepting small amount to large amount and maintenance of daily cash book. It is expected from the current Executive of the Bar Association to protect the interest of 19000 (nineteen thousand) Members, who are law abiding citizens and their money collected from them cannot be mismanaged in the manner as pointed out in the instant case, therefore [2025:RJ-JP:38846] (15 of 15) [CRLMB-1796/2025] immediate steps are required. It is necessary that a proper audit has to be conducted after appointing good Auditor and after receipt of report same be approved firstly by the Executive body and later by the General House. 25. Accordingly, the application for bail filed under Section 483 of BNSS preferred by the applicant-accused Ranveer Singh S/o Late Shri Mahendra Singh is hereby dismissed. (ASHOK KUMAR JAIN),J MR/14