“25 A perusal of the aforesaid paragraph shows that the emphasis laid by this Court was on the legislature, in its wisdom, not leaving it to the IO to make an application for seeking an extension of time from the Court and, thus, requiring the investigating agency to submit itself to the scrutiny of the Public Prosecutor, in the first instance, and satisfying him about the progress of the investigation and furnishing reasons for seeking further custody of an accused. Otherwise, an accused could be kept in continued detention, during unnecessarily prolonged investigation, at the whims of the police. This Court also emphasized that the Public Prosecutor is not a part of the investigating agency, but is an independent statutory authority and thus, is expected to independently apply his mind to the request of the investigating agency, before submitting a report to the Court for extension of time with a view to enable the investigating agency to complete its investigation. Thus, “He is not merely a post office or a forwarding agency. A Public Prosecutor may or may not agree with the reasons given by the investigating officer for seeking extension of time and may find that the investigation had not progressed in the proper manner or that there has been unnecessary, deliberate or avoidable delay in completing the investigation. In that event, he may not submit any report to the Court under clause (bb) to seek extension of time.”
