Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (SP)

Bengaluru, Apr 5: The court has extended the period of judicial custody of Mohammed Nalapad, son of MLA, N A Haris, by 14 days till April 17, when the case came up for hearing on Wednesday. As the high court had declined bail application of Nalapad, who had been arrested in connection with attack on Vidwat, he is likely to remain behind bars for some more time.

It is gathered that the family of Nalapad has not taken a concrete decision about approaching the Supreme Court (SC) for bail although the high court had declined bail to him about three weeks ago. It is said that Haris family plans to wait and watch rather than take the risk of approaching SC now on account of election period during which even small mistakes get highlighted. The family is afraid, that the personal charisma of the MLA, which is already dented on account of the above incident, might suffer further damage if the SC rejects the bail application. After the high court denied bail, there is no major development on which the family can build its bail plea.

Justice Sreenivas Harish Kumar of Karnataka high court had commented in his order about misuse of influence by the applicant, misuse of power, effort to twist evidences etc and that the CCTV footage shows the gravity of the incident. He also said that there is no guarantee that the accused, if released out on bail, will stay away from trying to destroy evidences. The advocates believe that these remarks will go a long way in adversely affecting the bail application in the SC.

The family, it is believed, is waiting for the police to file a charge sheet, deadline which is May 17. They feel that once the charge sheet is filed, on the basis of its content, they can approach SC for bail. But the likelihood of filing the charge sheet in a hurry is remote because of election-related work and the fear that hurrying through its submission may attract adverse criticism.

Already advocate for Vidwath has filed a caveat in the SC, requesting it not to pass unilateral orders on Nalapad's bail application if filed. Karnataka's special public prosecutor, Shyam Sundar, too has asked the SC not to decide on the said application without hearing his arguments.