The Allahabad High Court recently quashed an FIR registered under the Uttar Pradesh Gangsters and Anti-Social Activities (Prevention) Act, 1986, after noting that the mandatory joint meeting was not held and incorrect entries were made showing accused persons as being in jail despite the fact that they had been granted bail. A Bench of Justice JJ Munir and Justice Tarun Saxena thus allowed four connected writ petitions challenging the same FIR registered at a Police Station in Prayagraj, under Section 2/3(1) of the UP Gangsters Act.
The petitions primarily concerned a gang chart dated November 18, 2025, on the basis of which the impugned FIR was registered on the next day. The petitioners argued that the gang chart had not been approved after the mandatory joint meeting contemplated under Rule 5(3)(a) of the UP Gangsters Rules, 2021. This rule dictates that a gang chart will not be approved summarily but after due discussion in a joint meeting of the competent authorities.
In a commissionerate system, the High Court explained, the joint meeting in the present case had to take place between the Commissioner of Police and the Deputy Commissioner of Police concerned. Examining the gang chart, the Court found that the Commissioner of Police, Prayagraj and the Deputy Commissioner of Police, Nagar, Commissionerate Prayagraj had made independent endorsements on November 18, 2025. The DCP recommended the proceedings, and the CP approved them; however, this was not done in a joint meeting. Taking exception to the same, the Court observed that there was no discussion between the Commissioner of Police and the Deputy Commissioner of Police, which makes the approval of the gang chart fall foul of the mandatory requirements of Rule 5(3)(a) of the UP Gangsters Rules.
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The Bench further noted that even the endorsements of the Assistant Commissioner of Police, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Additional Commissioner of Police and Commissioner of Police did not indicate that the authorities had sat together in a joint meeting to take the decision.
False custody entries
The Court also found that the gang chart contained incorrect information regarding the custody status of several accused. In the leading petition concerning Devendra Pratap Singh alias Rahul Farji, the gang chart showed him as being in jail in connection with a 2024 Case. However, in that case, the High Court had already granted him bail in September 2025.
The Bench examined the bail order and found the entry in the gang chart to be incorrect and false. The Court remarked that the information in the gang chart about the petitioner being in jail in connection with the said crime is incorrect and false, vitiating the satisfaction of the authority who has approved the gang chart.
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The Court further noted that Devendra Pratap Singh had been proceeded against under the Gangsters Act on the basis of a solitary base case, in which he was on bail. The Court observed that this, by itself, may not, by itself, show him to be a member of a gang within the meaning of Section 2(b) of the Act.
The High Court also noted that the authorities had failed to examine the records accompanying the gang chart. The Bench observed that a man on bail, granted by this Court, has been regarded as one in jail, while approving the gang chart, betrays utter lack of application of mind.
In view of this, the Court found violations of Rules 5(3)(a), 8(2), and 16(1), (2) and (3) of the UP Gangsters Rules which, it said, rendered the detention bad. The Court also noted that the violation of Rule 5(3)(a) was present in all the connected matters. The Bench relied upon its earlier decision in Sanni Mishra alias Sanjayan Kumar Mishra v. State of U.P., where it had emphasized that competent authorities must ensure compliance with the Gangsters Rules while forwarding and approving a gang chart and that approval without examining whether the chart was prepared in accordance with the Rules amounts to non-application of an independent mind.