Ahmedabad, Sep 03: A day after the Supreme Court granted her interim bail in a case of allegedly fabricating evidence related to the 2002 Gujarat riots, activist Teesta Setalvad walked out of a prison on Saturday.
She had been lodged in the Sabarmati Central Jail since her arrest on June 26. As per the SC order, she was produced before sessions judge V A Rana for bail formalities. "The sessions court imposed two conditions over and above the conditions imposed by the apex court.
The sessions court asked the accused to furnish a personal bond of Rs 25,000 and not to leave India without its prior permission," special public prosecutor Amit Patel said.
A bench comprising Chief Justice Uday Umesh Lalit and justices S Ravindra Bhat and Sudhanshu Dhulia on Friday asked Setalvad to surrender her passport with trial court till the time the Gujarat High Court decides her regular bail plea.
The top court also asked Setalvad to cooperate with the probe agency in the investigation of the case of alleged fabrication of evidence to frame people in riots cases.
The offences alleged against her pertain to year 2002 and going by assertions, at best the concerned documents date to 2012. The investigating machinery has had the advantage of her custodial interrogation of seven days followed by judicial custody, the bench said while granting interim bail to Setalvad.
Referring to the sequence of events of the case, the bench said the high court, while issuing the notice to the state government on the regular bail petition, should have considered the plea for grant of interim bail to her.
The top court had on Thursday wanted to know the reason for the delayed listing of Setalvad's bail plea by the Gujarat High Court, wondering whether "this lady has been made an exception".
It wondered why the high court listed the bail prayer for hearing on September 19, six weeks after it sent a notice to the state government seeking a response to her application.
Referring to the case against Setalvad, which was registered days after the June 24 verdict of the apex court in the Zakia Jafri case, the bench said, Today as the case stands, the FIR is nothing but whatever has happened in the (supreme) court (judgement).
The bench was apparently referring to the verdict by the apex court bench led by Justice (since retired) AM Khanwilkar who had blamed the petitioners in the Zakia Zafri case for "keeping the pot boiling" and showing the "audacity" to question the integrity of the Special Investigation Team, and observed that "all those involved in such abuse of process need to be in the dock and proceeded with in accordance with law".