Supreme Court’s Andrabi Judgment Could Reshape UAPA Bail Jurisprudence

The Supreme Court’s judgment in Syed Iftikhar Andrabi v NIA is important not merely because it grants bail in a prosecution under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA). The real significance of the decision lies in the Court’s forceful reaffirmation of a basic constitutional principle that appears to have weakened in recent years: a bench of smaller strength cannot dilute, bypass, or hollow out the ratio laid down by a larger bench. The controversy before the Court arose from a familiar pattern in UAPA prosecutions. The appellant had spent almost six years in custody while trial remained nowhere near completion, with more than 350 prosecution witnesses still left to be examined. The prosecution allegations were undoubtedly grave and included accusations of narco-terror financing and links with proscribed organisations. However, the Court recognised that the issue before it was larger than the facts of one prosecution.The judgment repeatedly returned to the constitutional relationship between Article 21 and Section 43D(5) of the UAPA, and more importantly, to the question whether smaller benches of the Supreme Court could gradually narrow the force of a binding three-judge bench precedent without formally disagreeing with it.The Supreme Court’s Bail Debate Could Change the Fate of Umar and SharjeelThat precedent was Union of India v. K.A. Najeeb. In Najeeb, a three-judge bench of the Supreme Court had clearly held that while courts must ordinarily respect the legislative policy underlying stringent bail provisions under the UAPA, the constitutional guarantee of personal liberty under Article 21 cannot be eclipsed by statutory embargoes. The Court had observed that the rigours of Section 43D(5) would melt down where there was no likelihood of the trial being completed within a reasonable time and where incarceration had already become prolonged. The principle laid down in K.A. Najeeb comes from bedrock of personal liberty and freedom, it was a constitutional proposition that statutory restrictions remain subordinate to constitutional guarantees.However, over time, later decisions of smaller benches began reading Najeeb narrowly. Decisions such as Gurwinder Singh and later Gulfisha Fatima increasingly stressed that delay alone could not justify bail and that courts must continue giving primacy to the statutory threshold under Section 43D(5).The practical consequence of these decisions was significant. In many UAPA cases, the statutory embargo slowly began operating as a near-conclusive prohibition on bail, even where trials stretched endlessly and incarceration assumed a punitive character long before guilt could ever be established. Liberty became contingent not upon constitutional scrutiny but upon satisfaction of a severe prima facie threshold that is often extremely difficult to overcome at the bail stage.The Court in Andrabi directly confronted the departure from the K.A. Najeeb. The judgment expressly observed that the concern before the Court was the propriety of smaller Benches progressively hollowing out the constitutional force of a larger Bench decision without ever expressly disagreeing with it. The Court made it unmistakably clear that the subsequent narrowing of K.A. Najeeb posed an institutional problem that could not be ignored any longer.The Court thereafter reaffirmed a principle that should ordinarily require no restatement. A bench of lesser strength is bound by the law declared by a bench of greater strength. Judicial discipline requires either following the larger bench or referring the issue to a larger bench in case of disagreement. What is impermissible is indirect dilution. The judgment states this in express terms while discussing Gurwinder Singh, observing that a judgment rendered by a Bench of lesser strength is bound by the law declared by a Bench of greater strength and that a smaller Bench cannot dilute, circumvent, or disregard the ratio of a larger Bench.This aspect of the judgment is institutionally significant because it goes beyond UAPA bail jurisprudence. The authority of precedent within the Supreme Court depends entirely upon adherence to bench strength hierarchy. The Court functions through benches of varying numerical composition, but the coherence of constitutional adjudication depends upon a settled understanding that smaller benches cannot selectively reinterpret larger bench rulings into irrelevance. If that discipline weakens, the law itself becomes unstable. Trial courts and High Courts are left uncertain about which line of authority governs. Litigants begin encountering contradictory constitutional standards depending on which bench hears the matter. The Court’s legitimacy as a constitutional institution ultimately depends not merely upon correctness of outcomes but upon consistency in the application of precedent.Delhi Riots Bail Case: How the Supreme Court Redefined Protest as TerrorismThe importance of this principle becomes even more evident in cases involving liberty under special statutes like the UAPA. The Court in Andrabi itself recorded disturbing conviction statistics under the Act. Between 2019 and 2023, national conviction rates under the UAPA ranged roughly between 2 percent and 6 percent, while in Jammu and Kashmir the annual conviction rate remained below 1 percent. These figures become constitutionally troubling when viewed alongside prolonged pre-trial incarceration.If individuals spend five, six, or seven years in prison awaiting trial while conviction rates remain exceptionally low, pre-trial detention risks becoming punishment itself. The Court recognised this danger and asked a pointed question: should detention continue merely because allegations are serious?The answer given by the Court is constitutionally sound. Serious allegations do not suspend Article 21. The presumption of innocence does not disappear because the State invokes national security. Indeed, the judgment reiterates that “bail is the rule and jail is the exception” is not merely a statutory principle under ordinary criminal procedure but a constitutional value rooted in Articles 21 and 22. This part of the judgment is especially important because recent UAPA jurisprudence had increasingly treated stringent statutory wording as capable of fundamentally reversing ordinary constitutional assumptions about liberty.The Court also correctly rejected the tendency of courts to postpone constitutional scrutiny by directing speedy completion of trial instead of examining bail claims. Relying upon the Constitution Bench decision in High Court Bar Association, the judgment cautioned against routinely directing time-bound trials while continuing incarceration, particularly where trial courts are already overburdened and hundreds of witnesses remain to be examined.Such directions often create the appearance of constitutional protection without meaningfully addressing the deprivation of liberty suffered in the meantime.Ultimately, Andrabi does more than grant bail to one accused person. It restores the constitutional centrality of Article 21 within UAPA jurisprudence and simultaneously reasserts the discipline of precedent within the Supreme Court itself. The judgment recognises that constitutional courts cannot permit statutory embargoes to overpower constitutional guarantees, nor can smaller benches quietly weaken binding larger bench rulings through interpretive narrowing. The Court, therefore, reaffirmed that K.A. Najeeb remains binding law protected by stare decisis and cannot be diluted, circumvented, or disregarded by trial courts, High Courts or even by Benches of lower strength of this Court. (Kumar Kartikeya is an advocate, Supreme Court of India. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)

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