Car Crash Case: HC grants bail to J J Hospital doctor

Mumbai: A resident doctor of the state-run and city-based J J Hospital who was charged with culpable homicide but not murder after his car struck a motorcycle earlier this year and killed the rider has been granted bail by the Bombay High Court.

A single bench of Justice Bharati Dangre in her order passed on September 26, a copy of which was made available on Wednesday, noted that since the investigation in the case was over, accused doctor Rihan Kalathil's further incarceration was unnecessary.

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While the police claimed that Kalathil was heavily drunk, the latter in his bail plea refuted it and said he was not drunk to the level that he could not control his car.

In his plea, Kalathil had said he could not be charged under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) section 304 II (culpable homicide not amounting to murder), and that at the most he ought to be charged under the lesser section of 304 A (causing death by negligence).

Justice Dangre in her order noted the basic rule of the criminal system was "bail is the rule and jail is an exception."

"Punishment begins after conviction and every man is deemed to be innocent until duly tried and pronounced guilty," the court said while granting bail to Kalathil on a bond of Rs 50,000.

The court in its order took note of the witness statements that there was no divider on the said road and that Kalathil was driving his car in the middle of the road, but was not speeding.

It added that when Kalathil saw a bike approaching from the opposite direction, he swerved to the right but unfortunately the bike too swerved to the same side and there was a head-on collision.

Justice Dangre noted that the witness statements prima-facie reflect the conscious sense of Kalathil, who made an attempt to avoid the head-on collision, instead of establishing the prosecution case that the alcohol had disturbed his metabolism.

The court added that in the present case, the level of alcohol in the blood of Kalathil was below the prescribed limit.

"No doubt when a person consumes alcohol it may have an effect on his reflexes, but full effects of liquor would depend upon the amount consumed, the rate of consumption, gender, body weight, and whether the drink has been consumed on an empty stomach or full stomach and dependent upon this, the after-effect of intoxication will have to be judged," the court said.

"Same quantity of drinks may not necessarily produce a similar effect in each individual and it may vary and depend upon the person's size, metabolism, ethnicity, and other factors," it added.

Kalathil's counsel Aabad Ponda claimed that Kalathil was a doctor by profession and a meritorious student, whose further studies were being hampered due to his arrest.

Advocate Rizwan Merchant, appearing for victim Aditya Desai's mother, opposed the bail and said the family had lost their sole breadwinner. 

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