PMLA Bail, Prolonged Custody and Trial Delay: The Supreme Court's Contextual Approach in Udhaw Singh

The Supreme Court granted bail to a person prosecuted under the Prevention of Money-laundering Act, 2002 after finding that only one of 225 cited witnesses had been examined during fourteen months of custody and that the trial was unlikely to conclude for several years. The decision in Udhaw Singh v. Enforcement Directorate did not dilute Section 45 PMLA as a general rule. It applied the constitutional protection against unreasonably prolonged pre-trial detention to the demonstrated progress and scale of that particular trial.

The judgment, reported as 2025 INSC 247, was delivered on 17 February 2025 by Justices Abhay S. Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan in Criminal Appeal No. 799 of 2025, arising from SLP (Criminal) No. 18369 of 2024. The Court relied on V. Senthil Balaji v. Deputy Director, Directorate of Enforcement and Union of India v. K.A. Najeeb. It separately examined and distinguished Union of India through the Assistant Director v. Kanhaiya Prasad, decided four days earlier.

The issue in Udhaw Singh

Udhaw Singh had been arrested for an alleged offence under Section 3 PMLA. By the time the appeal was decided, he had undergone imprisonment for one year and two months. Paragraph 4 records two trial-progress facts that drove the result: the prosecution had cited 225 witnesses, and only one had been examined.

From those facts, the Court concluded that the trial was unlikely to finish within the next few years. It therefore held that the principle stated in V. Senthil Balaji applied. The decision is significant because it demonstrates how a constitutional delay inquiry operates alongside the statutory restrictions imposed by Section 45.

Section 45 remains the statutory starting point

Section 45(1) PMLA makes the offence cognizable and non-bailable and imposes the familiar twin conditions where the Public Prosecutor opposes release. The court must be satisfied that there are reasonable grounds for believing that the accused is not guilty of the offence and is not likely to commit an offence while on bail, subject to the statutory proviso and other applicable rules.

In Kanhaiya Prasad, 2025 INSC 210, the Supreme Court stressed that courts cannot grant PMLA bail casually without reckoning with these mandatory conditions. That judgment set aside a Patna High Court bail order which, according to paragraphs 16 to 23, had not properly addressed Section 45 or the alleged role and material against the accused.

Udhaw Singh did not reject that proposition. Instead, paragraph 5 explained why Kanhaiya Prasad did not govern the different factual situation before the Court. Section 45 and Article 21 perform distinct but related work: the former structures ordinary PMLA bail adjudication, while the latter prevents an undertrial from being detained for an unreasonably long period where there is no realistic prospect of timely adjudication.

The constitutional principle drawn from V. Senthil Balaji

In V. Senthil Balaji v. Deputy Director, Directorate of Enforcement, 2024 INSC 739, the Supreme Court considered the interaction between statutory bail restrictions, the likely duration of the proceedings and Article 21. Paragraphs 24 to 29 explain that statutes such as the PMLA prescribe a higher bail threshold but also require expeditious trials. A stringent bail condition cannot become an instrument for detention without trial for an unreasonable period.

Paragraph 27 identifies several factors relevant to deciding what constitutes a reasonable time. They include the minimum and maximum punishment, the severity of the statutory bail threshold, any legislative outer limit for concluding the trial, the realistic progress of the scheduled-offence and PMLA proceedings, and whether delay is substantially attributable to the accused. The Court also recognised that antecedents indicating a real societal threat may weigh against constitutional relief.

The principle is therefore not a fixed custody calculator. A court must examine the record and decide whether continued detention has become constitutionally disproportionate in the actual procedural circumstances.

The foundation in K.A. Najeeb

Union of India v. K.A. Najeeb, (2021) 3 SCC 713, arose under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 rather than the PMLA. Its constitutional reasoning is nonetheless important to the PMLA delay cases. Paragraph 17 held that statutory restrictions do not oust the constitutional courts' power to grant bail where prolonged incarceration and the unlikelihood of trial within a reasonable time produce a violation of Part III of the Constitution.

The Supreme Court in Najeeb balanced the gravity of the allegations against more than five years of custody, 276 witnesses still to be examined and the sentences received by convicted co-accused. The Court did not create an unrestricted right to bail under every special statute. It held that statutory policy and constitutional liberty can be harmonised, with the force of the statutory restriction diminishing where detention becomes unconscionably long in relation to the likely course of the trial.

Why Kanhaiya Prasad was different

The Enforcement Directorate relied on Kanhaiya Prasad to oppose Udhaw Singh's appeal. The Supreme Court read the official judgment and distinguished it on facts.

Paragraph 5 of Udhaw Singh records that Kanhaiya Prasad had been arrested on 18 September 2023 and granted bail by the High Court on 6 May 2024. He had remained in custody for less than seven months before the High Court order. More importantly, the High Court had recorded no finding that the trial was unlikely to conclude within a reasonable time.

The Supreme Court had cancelled bail in Kanhaiya Prasad because the High Court failed to engage with the mandatory Section 45 standard and the case material. Udhaw Singh explains that this outcome did not represent a departure from K.A. Najeeb or V. Senthil Balaji. Those precedents were factually inapplicable in Kanhaiya Prasad because the necessary foundation of prolonged custody and demonstrated trial delay had not been established.

In Udhaw Singh, the foundation was materially different: fourteen months of custody, 225 cited witnesses, only one examined, and an express judicial finding that conclusion was years away. The comparison shows why neither the number of months nor Section 45 can be applied in isolation.

The order granting bail

The Solicitor General fairly stated that V. Senthil Balaji could be followed on the facts. Paragraph 6 therefore held that Udhaw Singh deserved bail pending trial.

Under paragraph 7, the Court directed that he be produced before the Special Court within one week. The Special Court was required to release him on appropriate terms, including regular and punctual attendance, cooperation in early disposal of the case and surrender of his passport, if any. The appeal was allowed on those terms in paragraph 8.

These conditions reflect the ordinary purposes of pre-trial custody and bail: securing attendance, protecting the proceedings and enabling trial, without treating an unresolved accusation as punishment.

What the judgment does not decide

Udhaw Singh does not establish that fourteen months of custody automatically requires bail in every PMLA prosecution. It does not make the number of witnesses decisive without examining trial progress. Nor does it hold that the twin conditions in Section 45 have disappeared.

The judgment instead requires a concrete evidentiary foundation for an Article 21 claim. Relevant material may include the custody certificate, date of arrest, dates of cognizance and charge, the prosecution's witness and document lists, the number of witnesses examined, the pace of hearings, adjournment orders, the relationship between scheduled-offence and PMLA trials, the prescribed punishment, and responsibility for delay.

It is equally important to distinguish delay caused by the prosecution or the structure of the case from delay substantially attributable to the applicant. A party cannot manufacture delay and then rely on it as a constitutional ground. Risks of flight, evidence tampering, witness influence and further offending remain relevant and may be addressed through refusal or carefully framed conditions, depending on the record.

Current constitutional context

The constitutional principle remains contextual rather than mechanical. In Syed Iftikhar Andrabi v. National Investigation Agency, Jammu, 2026 INSC 503, a later Supreme Court decision under the UAPA and NDPS Act, the Court reaffirmed at paragraphs 27.10 and 27.11 that constitutional courts retain authority to intervene despite a statutory embargo when prolonged incarceration infringes liberty. At the same time, it expressly stated that the mere passage of time does not automatically entitle an accused to bail.

That later ruling concerned different statutes and facts, so it is not a substitute for the PMLA analysis required under Section 45. It reinforces the narrower point relevant here: a delay-based bail decision must be grounded in the duration and causes of custody, the realistic trial trajectory and the risks associated with release.

CrPC and BNSS references

V. Senthil Balaji arose from a bail application under Section 439 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973. The corresponding general High Court and Court of Session bail power is now contained in Section 483 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023. The transition does not replace or dilute the special restrictions in Section 45 PMLA; the applicable procedural code and the PMLA must be read together, subject to the BNSS repeal-and-savings provision in Section 531 for pending matters.

Udhaw Singh itself was an appellate decision applying the PMLA and Article 21. Its essential holding does not depend on substituting an IPC provision with a BNS provision or an Evidence Act provision with a BSA provision.

Practical lessons for bail applications

A persuasive delay-based application should show rather than merely assert that a trial cannot finish within a reasonable time. Counsel should place a dated procedural chronology before the court, calculate how much of the potential sentence has already been spent in custody, identify the unexamined witnesses, and explain why the estimate of future duration is realistic.

The application should also address Section 45 directly. Udhaw Singh is not authority for ignoring the twin conditions. The correct submission is that the statutory framework must be applied together with the independent constitutional protection against punitive pre-trial detention, on a record demonstrating actual and prospective delay.

For the prosecution, a general statement that the offence is serious will not answer a properly established Article 21 case. The response should identify concrete trial progress, explain necessary delays, distinguish avoidable adjournments, and show how risks associated with release cannot adequately be controlled by conditions.

Conclusion

Udhaw Singh reconciles two propositions that are sometimes presented as opposites. Section 45 PMLA imposes mandatory statutory restrictions and cannot be treated casually. Article 21 nevertheless prevents those restrictions from becoming a means of detention for years where the trial has barely progressed and no reasonable endpoint is visible.

The result depends on facts, not labels. Fourteen months of custody was legally significant in Udhaw Singh because it was coupled with 225 cited witnesses, only one examination and an express finding that the trial would take years. Kanhaiya Prasad reached the opposite result because the custody was shorter and the High Court had made no comparable finding of delay. The two decisions are therefore complementary applications of a contextual constitutional standard.

This article provides general legal information and does not constitute legal advice. Bail outcomes depend on the applicable statutory text, procedural history, evidence, custody period and subsequent judicial developments.

Sources

Supreme Court of India, Udhaw Singh v. Enforcement Directorate, 2025 INSC 247, Criminal Appeal No. 799 of 2025, judgment dated 17 February 2025, paragraphs 3–8: https://api.sci.gov.in/supremecourt/2024/56374/56374_2024_4_6_59497_Judgement_17-Feb-2025.pdf

Supreme Court of India, V. Senthil Balaji v. Deputy Director, Directorate of Enforcement, 2024 INSC 739, Criminal Appeal No. 4011 of 2024, judgment dated 26 September 2024, paragraphs 24–31: https://api.sci.gov.in/supremecourt/2024/12721/12721_2024_6_1501_56009_Judgement_26-Sep-2024.pdf

Supreme Court of India, Union of India v. K.A. Najeeb, Criminal Appeal No. 98 of 2021, judgment dated 1 February 2021, paragraphs 11–18: https://api.sci.gov.in/supremecourt/2019/40158/40158_2019_32_1501_25867_Judgement_01-Feb-2021.pdf

Supreme Court of India, Union of India through the Assistant Director v. Kanhaiya Prasad, 2025 INSC 210, Criminal Appeal No. 728 of 2025, judgment dated 13 February 2025, paragraphs 13–23: https://api.sci.gov.in/supremecourt/2024/22780/22780_2024_9_1501_59321_Judgement_13-Feb-2025.pdf

Supreme Court of India, Syed Iftikhar Andrabi v. National Investigation Agency, Jammu, 2026 INSC 503, judgment dated 18 May 2026, paragraphs 27.10–27.12: https://api.sci.gov.in/supremecourt/2025/71878/71878_2025_4_1501_71300_Judgement_18-May-2026.pdf

The Prevention of Money-laundering Act, 2002, Sections 3, 4 and 45: https://www.indiacode.nic.in/indiacode/handle/123456789/2036?view_type=browse

The Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, Sections 483 and 531: https://www.indiacode.nic.in/handle/123456789/20099

#PMLA #BailLaw #Article21