Chandigarh, Nov 15: The Punjab and Haryana High Court has held that an accused person cannot be stripped of the liberty granted through bail solely for initiating legal proceedings against the complainant in a criminal matter.
Dismissing a petition filed by DLF Limited, Justice Vikram Aggarwal refused to revoke the regular bail granted to former executive Ramesh Sanka. The court clarified that seeking judicial recourse does not constitute a breach of bail conditions, nor can it be interpreted as an effort to threaten or influence the complainant or prosecution witnesses.
“Resorting to legal remedies cannot, by any stretch of imagination, be said to be an act which may be termed to be a violation of the conditions of bail or which may amount to inducing, threatening, intimidating or influencing the petitioner and/or the prosecution witnesses,” Justice Aggarwal observed.
The High Court underlined that revoking bail is an exceptional step that demands strong, cogent justification and cannot be executed mechanically. DLF Limited had approached the court seeking the cancellation of regular bail that had been granted to Sanka via an order dated December 9, 2025.
The underlying dispute stems from an FIR registered on August 8, 2024, at the DLF Phase-I police station in Gurugram following a complaint by the real estate firm. The case was lodged under Sections 381, 385, 409, and 506 of the Indian Penal Code, alongside Section 66 of the Information Technology Act, 2000.
According to the company’s complaint, Sanka was associated with the organization from June 1, 2004, to July 2, 2014, during which he rose to the position of Managing Director of DLF Cyber City Developers Limited. The company alleged that he subsequently “started blackmailing the petitioner-company by threatening to misuse/leak their confidential data with a view to extort a sum of Rs. 311 crores.”
