2026:HHC:3003 IN THE HIGH COURT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH, SHIMLA Cr. MP (M) No. 2949 of 2025 Reserved on: 1.1.2026 Date of Decision: 09.1.2026. Amar Singh ...Petitioner Versus State of Himachal Pradesh ...Respondent Coram Hon’ble Mr Justice Rakesh Kainthla, Judge. Whether approved for reporting?1 No For the Petitioner : Mr. Yashveer Singh Rathore, Advocate. For the Respondent/State : Mr. Lokender Kutlehria, Additional Advocate General. Rakesh Kainthla, Judge The petitioner has 昀椀led the present petition for seeking regular bail in F.I.R. No. 112 of 2024, dated 25.09.2024, registered at Police Station, Palampur, District Kangra, H.P., for the commission of an o昀昀ence punishable under Section 20 of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act (NDPS Act). 2. It has been asserted that the police arrested the petitioner in the above-mentioned FIR. The prosecution case is 1 Whether reporters of Local Papers may be allowed to see the judgment? Yes. 2 2026:HHC:3003 based on totally absurd, baseless and imaginary story. No case is made out against the petitioner. There is no material to connect him to the commission of crime. There is no reasonable ground to believe that the petitioner has committed any o昀昀ence. The petitioner would abide by the terms and conditions which the Court may impose. Hence, the petition. 3. The petition is opposed by 昀椀ling a status report asserting that the police were on patrolling duty on 25.09.2024. They had set up naka at Chadiyar Chowk at 12:30 am. A vehicle bearing registration No. HP-66-3489 was intercepted by the police at 3:40 am. The driver identi昀椀ed himself as Amar Singh (the present petitioner), and the person sitting in the front seat identi昀椀ed himself as Mukesh Thakur. The police asked the driver to produce the document. The driver produced the registration certi昀椀cate in the name of Karma Bodh Singh. The driver could not produce the license and became frightened. The police searched the vehicle in the presence of Raju and recovered four packets wrapped with brown tape. These were opened and found to contain charas weighing 1.374 kilograms. The police seized the charas and arrested the petitioner and the co-accused. The charas was sent to SFSL, Junga, and as per the result, it was 3 2026:HHC:3003 con昀椀rmed to be an abstract of cannabis and a sample of charas. The charge sheet was 昀椀led before the Court on 24.03.2025 and the matter was listed for prosecution evidence on 19.12.2025. Hence, the status report. 4. I have heard Mr. Yashveer Singh Rathore, learned counsel for the petitioner and. Mr Lokender Kutlehria, learned Additional Advocate General for the respondent/State. 5. Mr. Yashveer Singh Rathore, learned counsel for the petitioner, submitted that the petitioner is innocent and he was falsely implicated. Prosecution violated Section 52A of the NDPS Act which is fatal to the prosecution case. Hence, he prayed that the present petition be allowed and the petitioner be released on bail. He relied upon the judgment of this Court in Shiranjana Buddha versus State of Himachal Pradesh 2025:HHC:39626 in support of his submission. 6. Mr. Lokender Kutlehria, learned Additional Advocate General for the respondent/State, submitted that the petitioner had earlier 昀椀led a petition which was dismissed by the Court and the subsequent petition only lies on the ground of change of 4 2026:HHC:3003 circumstances. Since, there is no change in the circumstances, therefore, he prayed that the present petition be dismissed. 7. I have given considerable thought to the submissions made at the bar and have gone through the records carefully. 8. It is undisputed that the petitioner had earlier 昀椀led a bail petition, which was registered as Cr.MP(M) No.2203 of 2025 and was dismissed on 27.10.2025. It was held in State of Maharashtra Vs. Captain Buddhikota Subha Rao (1989) Suppl. 2 SCC 605, that a subsequent bail application can only be considered if there is a change of circumstances. It was observed: “Once that application was rejected, there was no question of granting a similar prayer. That is virtually overruling the earlier decision without there being a change in the fact situation. And when we speak of change, we mean a substantial one, which has a direct impact on the earlier decision and not merely cosmetic changes, which are of little or no consequence. 'Between the two orders, there was a gap of only two days, and it is nobody's case that during these two days, drastic changes had taken place necessitating the release of the respondent on bail. Judicial discipline, propriety and comity demanded that the impugned order should not have been passed, reversing all earlier orders, including the one rendered by Puranik, J., only a couple of days before, in the absence of any substantial change in the fact situation. In such cases, it is necessary to act with restraint and circumspection so that the process of the Court is not abused by a litigant and an impression does not gain ground that the litigant has either 5 2026:HHC:3003 successfully avoided one judge or selected another to secure an order which had hitherto eluded him. 9. Similarly, it was held in Kalyan Chandra Sarkar v. Rajesh Ranjan @ Pappu Yadav (2004) 7 SCC 528, that where an earlier bail application has been rejected, the Court has to consider the rejection of the earlier bail application and then consider why the subsequent bail application should be allowed. It was held: “11. In regard to cases where earlier bail applications have been rejected, there is a further onus on the court to consider the subsequent application for grant of bail by noticing the grounds on which earlier bail applications have been rejected and after such consideration, if the court is of the opinion that bail has to be granted then the said court will have to give speci昀椀c reasons why in spite of such earlier rejection the subsequent bail application should be granted.” 10. A similar view was taken in State of T.N. v. S.A. Raja, (2005) 8 SCC 380, wherein it was observed: 9. When a learned Single Judge of the same court had denied bail to the respondent for certain reasons, and that order was unsuccessfully challenged before the appellate forum, without there being any major change of circumstances, another fresh application should not have been dealt with within a short span of time unless there were valid grounds giving rise to a tenable case for bail. Of course, the principles of res judicata are not applicable to bail applications, but the repeated 昀椀ling of bail applications without there being any change of circumstances would lead to bad precedents. 6 2026:HHC:3003 11. This position was reiterated in Prasad Shrikant Purohit v. State of Maharashtra (2018) 11 SCC 458, wherein it was observed: 30. Before concluding, we must note that though an accused has a right to make successive applications for the grant of bail, the court entertaining such subsequent bail applications has a duty to consider the reasons and grounds on which the earlier bail applications were rejected. In such cases, the court also has a duty to record the fresh grounds which persuade it to take a view di昀昀erent from the one taken in the earlier applications. 12. It was held in Ajay Rajaram Hinge v. State of Maharashtra, 2023 SCC OnLine Bom 1551, that a successive bail application can be 昀椀led if there is a material change in the circumstances, which means a change in the facts or the law. It was observed: 7. It needs to be noted that the right to 昀椀le successive bail applications accrues to the applicant only on the existence of a material change in circumstances. The sine qua non for 昀椀ling subsequent bail applications is a material change in circumstances. A material change in circumstances settled by law is a change in the fact situation or law which requires the earlier view to be interfered with or where the earlier 昀椀nding has become obsolete. However, a change in circumstances has no bearing on the salutary principle of judicial propriety that successive bail application needs to be decided by the same Judge on the merits, if available at the place of sitting. There needs to be clarity between the power of a judge to consider the application and a person's right based on a material change in circumstances. A material change in circumstance creates in a person accused of an 7 2026:HHC:3003 o昀昀ence the right to 昀椀le a fresh bail application. But the power to decide such a subsequent application operates in a completely di昀昀erent sphere, unconnected with the facts of a case. Such power is based on the well-settled and judicially recognised principle that if successive bail applications on the same subject are permitted to be disposed of by di昀昀erent Judges, there would be con昀氀icting orders, and the litigant would be pestering every Judge till he gets an order to his liking resulting in the credibility of the Court and the con昀椀dence of the other side being put in issue and there would be wastage of Court's time and that judicial discipline requires that such matter must be placed before the same Judge, if he is available, for orders. The satisfaction of material change in circumstances needs to be adjudicated by the same Judge who had earlier decided the application. Therefore, the same Judge needs to adjudicate whether there is a change in circumstance as claimed by the applicant, which entitles him to 昀椀le a subsequent bail application.” 13. Therefore, the present petition only lies because of the change in circumstance. 14. It was submitted that the samples were not representative and there is nothing to conclude that the petitioner was found in possession of commercial quantity of charas. This submission will not help the petitioner. It was mentioned in the status report that the case property was produced before the Court and the Court had taken two samples of 25 grams each which were sent for analysis. There is a presumption under Section 114 of the Indian Evidence Act regarding the regularity of the o昀케cial acts done by the public 8 2026:HHC:3003 o昀케cials especially the Judicial O昀케cer. There is no material on record at this stage that there was any irregularity in taking the representative samples. Hence the submission that the samples were not representative cannot be accepted. 15. In Shiranjan Buddha (supra) the recovery was e昀昀ected from two persons and the police obtained the samples after mixing the contraband. The Court held that since the contraband was mixed, therefore, it could not be said that each person was found in possession of the contraband. In the present case there is nothing to show that the recovery was e昀昀ected from any other person. Hence, the cited judgment does not apply to the present case. 16. There is no other change in the circumstance, hence the petitioner cannot be held entitled to bail. Consequently, the present petition fails and it is dismissed. 17. The observations made here-in-above are regarding the disposal of this petition and will have no bearing, whatsoever, on the case's merits. (Rakesh Kainthla) Judge 9th January, 2026 (Chander)