Ravindra Maithani, J
1. Applicant is in judicial custody in FIR/Case Crime No.378 of 2024, under Section 376 IPC, Police Station Patelnagar, District Dehradun. He has sought his release on bail.
2. Heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the record.
3. According to the FIR, the applicant and the victim were known to each other for the past 15 years from the date of filing of the FIR. The applicant has private photographs of the victim. He would blackmail the victim under the garb of those photographs.
4. Learned counsel for the applicant would submit that the applicant and the victim both are major. Their relationship was consensual. The applicant never made the videos viral. These photographs were intimate. They were personal only. He would submit that the charge-sheet has not been filed under the Information Technology Act, 2000 (“the Act”).
5. Learned State Counsel would submit that the applicant and the victim were initially consensual, but thereafter, the applicant started threatening to make her intimate videos viral. She would submit that the charge-sheet has not been filed under the Act. There is no evidence of making the photos and videos viral.
6. Having considered, this Court is of the view that the applicant may be enlarged on bail.
7. The bail application is allowed.
8. Let the applicant be released on bail, on his executing a personal bond and furnishing two reliable sureties, each of the like amount, to the satisfaction of the Court concerned.
