Police papers showed FIR number before case registration, high court grants bail to drug accused

NEW DELHI: The Uttarakhand high court has granted bail to two accused under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act (NDPS) after spotting a discrepancy in the police paperwork, as some documents had the FIR number on them before even the FIR was registered.Justice Ashish Naithani decided the bail pleas of Bhawan Singh and Prem Singh together in a single common order, since both were booked in the same case.What was the disputeBhawan Singh and Prem Singh were named in an FIR under the NDPS Act. Police claimed that on January 5, 2026, they caught the two men near Pithoragarh, and recovered 2 kg of charas from each of them. Since this is a large amount, it counts as a "commercial quantity" under the law, which makes it harder to get bail.After the lower court rejected their bail plea, the two accused moved the high court.Their counsel said that the two men were falsely framed and that the whole case depended on this recovery. He pointed out that the inventory report and arrest memo, supposedly written up at the spot before the FIR was even filed, already had the FIR number on them.He also argued that this couldn't be a small clerical mistake, since these papers are the foundation of any drug case.

He also said the recovery happened in a public place but no outside witness was present, and there were mismatches in the timing of the paperwork. He further said the applicants had sought CCTV footage from the area, which they believed would back their claim that they were elsewhere at the time.The state, while opposing the bail, said that since 2 kg was recovered from each man, the amount was large enough to trigger the law's tougher bail rules.

It said the recovery process was done properly and that the forensic lab report backed its case.It also argued that a rule about personal body searches didn't apply here, since the drugs were found in bags the men were carrying, not on their bodies. It also denied the applicants' claim that CCTV footage had been deleted.What did the court orderJustice Naithani said he was aware that the quantity involved was large, which usually makes it harder to get bail.

But he added that the bigger issue for him was the mix-up with the paperwork.The court said the inventory report and arrest memo aren't just routine papers — instead, they are the on-the-spot record of the search, recovery and arrest, and form an important part of the case.Since these papers were supposed to have been made before the FIR was registered, but already carried the FIR number, the court said there appeared to be a mismatch in the timeline of events, since an FIR number simply wouldn't exist at that stage.The court added that this couldn't be treated as a small or routine slip-up, and that it raised real doubts about the order in which things actually happened, as claimed by the police.It further added that even without looking at the other arguments raised by the defence, this one problem alone was enough to raise doubts about how trustworthy the recovery process was.The court allowed both bail applications and ordered that Bhawan Singh and Prem Singh be released after furnishing a personal bond and two reliable sureties of a matching amount, to the satisfaction of the local court.