Allahabad HC judge seeks removal from bail roster after Supreme Court rebuke: ‘Demoralising, chilling effect’

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• Supreme Court criticizes Allahabad HC's bail order in dowry death case
• Justice Bhatia recused himself from future bail matters
• Justice Bhatia noted Supreme Court's remarks were demoralising

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A recent order of the Supreme Court has triggered an unusual development at the Allahabad High Court. On February 9, a Bench comprising Justices JB Pardiwala and KV Viswanathan set aside a bail order passed by Justice Pankaj Bhatia in a dowry death case, describing it as “one of the most shocking and disappointing” orders it had encountered in recent times.

The top court expressed astonishment at the reasoning adopted by the High Court. “We fail to understand on plain reading of the impugned order as to what the High Court is trying to convey. What weighed with the High Court in exercising its discretion in favour of the accused for the purpose of grant of bail in a very serious crime like dowry death,” the Bench observed.

It further remarked, “What did the High Court do? All that the High Court did, was to record the submission of the defense counsel and thereafter proceeded to observe that the accused was in jail since 27.07.2025 and there being no criminal history, he was entitled to bail. Accordingly, bail came to be granted.”

The Supreme Court said that the reasoning was wholly insufficient and ordered the accused to surrender before the trial court.

Justice Bhatia steps aside

Four days later, Justice Pankaj Bhatia of the Allahabad High Court recused himself from hearing a separate bail matter and requested that he not be assigned bail work in the future.

The case listed before him on Friday was unrelated to the one that drew criticism from the Supreme Court, yet the judge chose not to proceed with it.

In a two-page order, he directed that the bail plea be placed before the Chief Justice for reassignment. “The bail application is released to be placed before Hon'ble the Chief Justice for assigning the same to another Bench with a further request to Hon'ble the Chief Justice not to assign Bail Roster to me in future,” he stated.

Justice Bhatia acknowledged that judicial decisions are often scrutinised and sometimes overturned. “Although, it is well known that there is no judge who can claim that his order never has been set aside or interfered and I also feel from the perusal of the judgment that the bail order granting the bail was apparently subject to interference,” he said.

However, he added that the language used by the apex court had a profound impact on him. The observations in particular paragraphs of the Supreme Court ruling, he noted, had a “huge demoralising and chilling effect” on him.

He also mentioned that he had read media reports about the Supreme Court’s order.

The dowry death case

The controversy stemmed from an FIR lodged by the father of a 22-year-old woman, Sushma, who had married the accused on March 1, 2025.

According to the complaint, Rs 3.5 lakh in cash and other dowry articles were given at the time of marriage. The father alleged that despite this, the husband and his family continued to demand a four-wheeler and subjected his daughter to harassment.

In the early hours of April 25, 2025, the father was informed that his daughter had died. Upon reaching her matrimonial home, he claimed to have seen marks around her neck and alleged that she had been killed over dowry demands.

The post-mortem examination recorded the cause of death as asphyxia due to strangulation. A chargesheet followed, and the matter was committed to the sessions court where charges were framed.

While granting bail, the High Court had recorded the defence submission that the hyoid bone was intact and that, according to a medical jurisprudence text, strangulation was therefore not possible.

The court then noted that the accused had been in custody since April 27, 2025 and had no prior criminal record, and on that basis granted bail.

It was this reasoning that drew the Supreme Court’s ire. The apex court found that relevant considerations in a serious offence such as dowry death had not been adequately addressed.

Past friction and broader context

This is not the first time the Bench led by Justice Pardiwala has expressed strong disapproval of orders passed by the Allahabad High Court in criminal matters.

Last year, in a separate case, the Supreme Court had directed the Chief Justice of the High Court to refrain from assigning criminal matters to a particular judge after criticising the reasoning in a case involving refusal to quash criminal proceedings. That direction had faced opposition from thirteen High Court judges, who wrote to the Chief Justice urging that the Supreme Court’s directions not be implemented.

The top court later recalled that order within four days.

In yet another criminal matter, the same Bench had expressed dissatisfaction with a High Court decision declining to suspend a fixed-term sentence without applying settled legal principles governing sentence suspension.

In the present episode, Justice Bhatia’s decision to step back from bail matters reflects the immediate fallout from the Supreme Court’s sharp observations.

While he conceded that the bail order was open to interference, he made it clear that the tone and wording of the criticism had left him deeply affected, describing their impact as “demoralising” and having a “chilling effect.”