Supreme Court: UAPA's bar on bail for foreign citizens does not override statutory default bail

The Supreme Court held that the special restriction on bail for foreign citizens accused under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 (UAPA) does not take away an accused's statutory right to default bail when the investigating agency fails to file a chargesheet in time. Section 43D(7) of the UAPA bars granting bail to a foreign citizen who entered India illegally or whose authorised stay became illegal, unless his identity and antecedents are established. The Union of India argued this provision barred bail to a foreign national, granted statutory ('default') bail years earlier under Section 167(2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure after the chargesheet was not filed on time.

A Bench of Justices Aravind Kumar and Vipul M. Pancholi held that Section 43D(7)'s overriding effect, by its own terms, is confined to sub-sections (5) and (6) of Section 43D, which govern bail granted on merits — not to sub-section (2), which makes Section 167(2) CrPC's default bail applicable to UAPA cases. The Court also held the restriction applies only if the person's entry into India was itself unauthorised or illegal, not merely if a later-expired visa made his continued stay illegal, and found no special or strong ground to justify cancelling bail years after it was granted. The appeal against the grant of bail was accordingly dismissed.