Separate NDPS Recoveries Cannot Be Combined Into Commercial Quantity: Rajasthan High Court Grants Bail in Cocaine Case

On 02.09.2025 an in-charge Sub-Inspector of Police Station Bajaj Nagar, Jaipur, detained three persons and, after Section 50 notices, recovered 4.36 grams of MDMA from one co-accused; 6.91 grams of cocaine in six plastic pouches and 4.9 grams of hybrid foreign ganja from the applicant; and D28 tablets and LSD from the other; the applicant has been in custody since that day (para 7). His counsel said the ganja was small quantity, the cocaine below commercial quantity with a police note that its pure weight could not be taken inside the pouches, and the recoveries separate (Akhlak @ Vilsan); he also cited deleted CCTV footage, no independent witness and no antecedents (paras 2-4). The Public Prosecutor opposed bail (para 5).

The Court noted the defence's assertion, also made before the trial court, that police took the building's DVR at the time of recovery and returned it after deleting the CCTV recording; it made no finding on it (para 8). It then applied Akhlak @ Vilsan v. State of Rajasthan, in which a co-ordinate Bench, construing ‘commercial quantity’ and ‘small quantity’ under the NDPS Act, opined that recoveries effected separately during a search cannot be combined or shown as a joint recovery to conclude that the quantity is commercial (para 8). A police report placed before the Special Court on 11.09.2025 showed separate recoveries from each of the three accused, so whether the quantity was commercial or small had to be judged on each individual recovery (para 8). On that footing the cocaine and ganja recovered from the applicant were not commercial quantity, and Section 37 of the NDPS Act, which the trial court had considered applicable, did not apply (para 8). Weighing the grounds raised and the absence of any apprehension that the applicant would abscond, tamper with evidence or influence witnesses, the Court found bail justified (para 9).