Delhi High Court: In the application filed by the accused-petitioner, arrested under a case involving illegal international telephone exchange incurring losses to the Government and telecom companies to the tune of Rs. 1.2 cr per day, was seeking bail for being registered for offences under Sections 420 and 120-B of Penal Code, 1860 (IPC) and under Sections 20, 21, 25 Telegraph Act, 1885, Amit Sharma, J., granted bail upon his furnishing a personal bond in the sum of Rs. 50,000 with one surety of the like amount as the investigation was found to be complete and the accused has been in judicial custody since 30-09-2021.
It was alleged that an illegal international telephone exchange setup was found in Chawri Bazar, Old Delhi run by one Zulifiqar Ali alias Raja by using new era software-driven technology for routing calls from foreign countries like USA, UAE, Canada, Australia, etc. to India via illegal route of internet by passing the legal international and national call gateways of India.
This illegal telephone exchange had the capacity of handling 2500 international calls simultaneously using the 2500 SIP channels taken from Reliance Jio, the biggest illegal setup in India. It was further alleged that the said setup was causing huge financial losses to the Government and telecom companies to the tune of Rs. 1.2 Crore rupees per day.
Thus, a joint raid was conducted at the premises of Adeeba Enterprises and an illegal setup running at the site with the help of devices was discovered and the said devices were seized, and the accused was thereby arrested.
The Court considered that two high-speed wifi connections were in the name of the present applicant along with that the investigation qua the accused stands completed and he has been in judicial custody since September 2021 and granted bail to the accused with the following conditions: –
i. Accused will not leave the country without prior permission of the trial Court.
ii. Accused shall intimate the trial Court by way of an affidavit and to the Investigating Officer (IO) regarding any change in residential address.
iii. Accused shall appear before the Court as and when the matter is taken up for hearing
iv. The accused shall join investigation as and when called by the IO concerned.
v. Accused shall provide his mobile number to the IO and intimate about any change
[Areeb Ali v State of NCT of Delhi, 2022 SCC OnLine Del 4590, decided on 20-12-2022]
Advocates who appeared in this case :
For petitioner- Mr. Rajive Maini, Ms. Shriya Maini, Advocates alongwith Ms. Tanveer Begum (Mother of the petitioner) and Mr. Pairokar Imran in-person.
For respondent- Mr. Amit Ahlawat, APP for the State with Mr. Gagan Kumar, Advocate with Inspector Chaitanya Abhijit, P.S: Cyber. Mr. Naveen Chandra, Advocate with Mr.Saurabh Kathuria, Sr. Manager, (Regulatory) for Telecom Provider (Airtel).
*Arunima Bose, Editorial Assistant has reported this brief