The Punjab and Haryana High Court ruled that the first proviso to Section 45(1) of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 exempts all women from the twin bail conditions, irrespective of their educational background, profession, or societal status. The court rejected the argument that only economically weaker or uneducated women should benefit from this proviso. The exemption is absolute and applies uniformly to every woman accused under PMLA, regardless of personal circumstances.

Section 45 of PMLA imposes twin bail conditions — the court must be satisfied that there are reasonable grounds to believe the accused is not guilty, and that the accused is not likely to commit any offence while on bail. These conditions are significantly more stringent than ordinary bail under CrPC/BNSS and reverse the ordinary presumption of innocence in practice.

However, the first proviso to Section 45(1) carves out an exception: the twin conditions do not apply to accused persons who are under sixteen years of age, women, or sick or infirm persons. This proviso is a legislative protection, not a judicial discretion.

The Punjab and Haryana High Court's ruling clarifies that this exemption is not means-tested or status-filtered. The legislature used the word 'women' without qualification, and courts cannot read in a distinction between educated and uneducated, rich and poor, or high-status and low-status women. The ruling is significant because it prevents prosecuting agencies from arguing that a financially sophisticated or professionally accomplished woman accused under PMLA should be held to the twin-condition standard.

For CLAT PG, this matters because the examiner tests interpretation of statutory provisos, especially where the plain meaning of a word (here, 'women') conflicts with purposive arguments. The principle — that a statutory exception must be read as written — is directly testable through passage-based MCQs asking you to apply the proviso to new fact patterns.