India, May 11 -- The Supreme Court has held that there cannot be a mechanical denial of anticipatory bail merely because offences under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act are invoked, underlining that courts must carefully scrutinise the facts and allegations in each case before refusing relief.

A bench of justices JB Pardiwala and Ujjal Bhuyan said that the statutory bar contained in Section 18 of the SC/ST Act cannot be applied in a routine or automatic manner and the nature of allegations in the FIR as well as supporting material on record must be examined.

"So far as the bar of Section 18 of the Atrocities Act is concerned, we may only say that it would all depend on the facts of each case. It w...