The Bombay High Court on Monday rejected the bail plea of Republic TV editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami and two others in a 2018 abetment to suicide case.
The court has asked the accused to move a lower court for bail in the case.
A division bench of Justices SS Shinde and MS Karnik while rejecting the interim bail pleas of Arnab Goswami and the two other accused Feroze Shaikh and Nitish Sarda said, "no case has been made out for us (court) to exercise our extraordinary jurisdiction".
With the high court refusing interim bail to Arnab Goswami, his stay at the Taloja jail will be extended.
Arnab Goswami and the two others were arrested by Alibaug police in Maharashtra's Raigad district on November 4 in connection with the suicide of architect-interior designer Anvay Naik and his mother in 2018 over alleged non-payment of dues by companies of the accused.
The HC in its order on Monday said, "The petitioners have the efficacious remedy of seeking bail before the sessions court concerned. We have already noted earlier that if such bail plea is filed, then the sessions court shall decide the same in four days."
[BREAKING] Bombay High Court refuses interim relief to #ArnabGoswai https://t.co/mlp0ZpUU3Q
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The bench noted that refusal of the interim bail applications shall not affect the remedy available to the petitioners to seek regular bail. It said the sessions court shall hear and decide the bail pleas on merits.
"Rejection of interim order shall not be construed as an impediment to the petitioners seeking alternate remedies. The observations made in this order rejecting interim bail are prima facie only," the high court said in its order.
Arnab Goswami on Monday morning filed a bail application in the Alibaug sessions court, his lawyer Gaurav Parkar told news agency PTI.
Arnab Goswami, Feroze Shaikh and Nitish Sarda last week filed petitions in the Bombay High Court challenging their "illegal arrest" in the case and seeking interim bail. Apart from interim bail, the petitioners also sought that the HC stay the investigation into the case and quash the FIR against them.
The court will hear their pleas seeking to quash the FIR on December 10.
Republic TV chief Arnab Goswami was arrested on November 4 from his Lower Parel residence in Mumbai and taken to Alibaug in neighbouring Raigad district. He and the two other accused were later produced before a magistrate who refused to send them in police custody and remanded them in judicial custody till November 18.
Arnab Goswami was initially kept at a local school which is designated as a Covid-19 quarantine centre for the Alibaug prison. He was on Sunday shifted to the Taloja jail in Raigad district after allegedly being found using a mobile phone while in judicial custody, according to police.