OBSERVING THAT the space near a lift in a building is a public place and seizure of drugs from there cannot be considered as possession, a special court granted bail to a 34-year-old woman.
The Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) had claimed that 20 kg of mephedrone drug was seized which was concealed by the accused woman near the lift in 2023. The agency had arrested Alfiya Shaikh, a resident of Dongri, under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act, alleging that since the recovery was from a space outside her apartment, it amounts to ‘conscious possession’ which would be punishable.
Shaikh through her lawyer had claimed that nothing was recovered from her house or personal search and the recovery of the contraband was from a space near the lift of a residential apartment, where the woman lives. Shaikh had claimed that she was falsely implicated.
“…the contraband was found on the second floor of the building behind the door, near the lift and not in her house. The open space near the lift would be a public place, because every member of the society including the watchman and labourers have access to the entire building. They can go to any floor for their work. I mean to say that, the place from which the contraband has been seized is a public place and the accused has no exclusive control over the same,” the special court said in its order on Saturday.
The court also said that while the NCB had claimed that Shaikh had said in a confessional statement that she was the one who kept the drugs there to conceal them, the statement is not admissible as evidence unless there is other cogent and corroborative evidence. The court also said that Call Data Records (CDR), showing that Shaikh was in touch with other co-accused also cannot prove criminal conspiracy as there is no transcript of their conversation.
Shaikh was arrested on June 10, 2023, and was released in January 2024 for six months on temporary bail as she was about to deliver a child. The court also considered that she has an infant child while granting her bail.
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