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On Wednesday (March 25), a bench of Justices J.B. Pardiwala and Vijay Bishnoi of the Supreme Court cancelled the bail granted by the Patna high court to a man accused of his wife’s dowry death. The order in Lal Muni Devi v. State of Bihar (Criminal Appeal No. 1626/2026) invoked the gravity of dowry death as a social evil, criticised the high court for a “mechanical approach,” and directed that a copy be forwarded to the chief justice of the Patna high court.

Coming weeks after Justice Pardiwala’s intervention in Chetram Verma v. State of U.P., which prompted Justice Pankaj Bhatia of the Allahabad high court to seek removal from the bail roster citing a “huge demoralising and chilling effect,” this order deepens the concern that the Supreme Court is carving out a class of offences where the constitutional norm of bail stands functionally reversed.

A woman was found dead at her matrimonial home in Patna in September 2024, roughly a year and a half after her marriage. Her mother lodged an FIR alleging dowry harassment and murder.

The husband was arrested and charged under Sections 103(1) (murder) and 80 (dowry death) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023. The post-mortem report recorded grave injuries: a skull fracture with lacerated brain matter, a ruptured sternum and heart, and a fractured pelvis. The cause of death was haemorrhage and shock due to head injury. The defence contended that the deceased, said to have been in an unstable state of mind, had jumped from the sixth floor of a building.

Both the sessions court and the high court initially declined bail. A second application was filed in late 2025, by which time the accused had been in custody for over 16 months. The high court called for a report from the trial court, noted that charge had been framed, that only one of eight witnesses had been examined, and that the trial was unlikely to conclude in the near future. It released the accused on conditions including cooperation with the trial and liability for cancellation in the event of witness tampering.

Rhetoric over reasoning

The Supreme Court held the order “wholly unsustainable,” faulting the high court for not discussing “anything”. But the impugned order, as reproduced by the Supreme Court itself at paragraph nine, tells a different story. It........

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