New Delhi: A Supreme Court bench today appeared to doubt another apex court bench’s judgment in the controversial order in which it denied bail to scholars and activists Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam.The Supreme Court in January this month rejected bail for Khalid and Imam, both of whom have been incarcerated for over five years in connection with what the Delhi Police believes is the “larger conspiracy” behind the Delhi communal violence of 2020. It granted bail to Gulfisha Fatima, Meeran Haider, Shifa Ur Rehman, Shadab Ahmed, and Mohammad Saleem Khan.LiveLaw reports that today, May 18, Justice B.V. Nagarathna and Justice Ujjal Bhuyan expressed reservations against that order while allowing the bail plea of one Syed Iftikhar Andrabi, who has been under custody for over five years in a Unlawful Activities Prevention Act case for alleged narco-terrorism.The bench said that the court did not properly follow the judgment delivered by a three-judge bench in 2021 in the Union of India v. KA Najeeb which found the long delay in trial as a ground for bail in cases under the UAPA.LiveLaw reported that the court also noted that the Najeeb judgment was not honoured in the 2024 Gurwinder Singh v. Union of India.“We have serious reservations about judgment in Gulfisha Fatima. The judgment in Gulfisha Fatima would have us believe that Najeeb [a caselaw which says accused cannot be indefinitely jails] is only a narrow and exceptional departure from Section 43D(5), justified in extreme factual situations. It is this hollowing out of the import of the observations in Najeeb that we are concerned with. The broad reading of Najeeb suggests that the mere passage of time, if it arises from all surrounding circumstances, mechanically entitles an accused to release,” Bar and Bench reported the court as having said.The bench said that Najeeb was sacrosanct and could not be meddled with.“In that spirit, we make it clear that Najeeb is binding law and entitled to the protection of judicial discipline. It cannot be diluted, circumvented, or disregarded by trial courts, High Courts, or even by benches of lower strength of this Court,” the court said.The bench also observed that the pre-Najeeb judgment in NIA v. Zahoor Ahmed Shah Watali (2019) cannot be invoked to justify prolonged pre-trial incarceration under UAPA.“We have no manner of doubt in stating that even under UAPA, bail is the rule and jail is the exception. Of course, in an appropriate case, bail can be denied having regard to the facts of that particular case,” the Bar and Bench report said.The court also made a note on bench strength.“A judgement rendered by a bench of lesser strength is bound by the law declared by the bench of greater strength. Judicial discipline mandates that such a binding precedent must either be followed or, in case of doubt, be referred to a larger bench. A smaller bench cannot dilute, circumvent or disregard the ratio of a larger bench,” Justice Bhuyan said in the judgment, according to LiveLaw.