<h1>Bail as a foundational principle: courts must treat bail as the rule while special laws compel merits scrutiny in bail hearings.</h1> The lecture emphasises that bail should be treated as the rule and arrest is not invariably mandatory under Section 41 CrPC, noting that police failures and public pressure lead to arrest focused practice; restrictive special laws force courts to examine merits at the bail stage, increasing judicial burden and complicating routine bail adjudication, while social media trials and systemic infrastructure deficits further undermine evidence based adjudication and public confidence.