NEW DELHI: Opining that unreasonable delay in passing a detention order can snap "live and proximate link" between prejudicial activities and the purpose of detention of a person, SC recently set aside a detention order passed by Tripura government five months after the receipt of proposal.
The court also noted that preventive detention is a serious invasion of personal liberty.
“Object of the preventive detention, it becomes very imperative on the part of the detaining authority as well as the executing authorities to remain vigilant and keep their eyes skinned but not to turn a blind eye in passing the detention order at the earliest from the date of the proposal and executing the detention order because any indifferent attitude on the part of the detaining authority or executing authority would defeat the very purpose of the preventive action and turn the detention order as a dead letter and frustrate the entire proceedings,” the court said.
A bench of CJI UU Lalit, Justice SR Bhat and JB Pardiwala held that an unreasonable delay between getting a proposal and passing an order for detention would make the order invalid.
“If there is unreasonable delay between the date of the order of detention & actual arrest of the detenu and in the same manner from the date of the proposal and passing of the order of detention, such delay unless satisfactorily explained throws a considerable doubt on the genuineness of the requisite subjective satisfaction of the detaining authority in passing the detention order and consequently render the detention order bad and invalid,” court said.
“The normal methods open to a person charged with commission of any offence to disprove the charge or to prove his innocence at the trial are not available to the person preventively detained and, therefore, in prevention detention jurisprudence whatever little safeguards the Constitution and the enactments authorizing such detention provide assume utmost importance and must be strictly adhered to,” court also said.
Court’s order came in an appeal preferred by the detenu against Tripura HC’s order of affirming the detention order dated November 12, 2021 passed by Tripura government.
While setting aside the detention order, the court also noted that there was no explanation worth the name why it took almost five months for the detaining authority to pass the order of preventive detention.
“The detaining authority remained oblivious of the fact that in both the criminal cases relied upon by the detaining authority for the purpose of passing the order of detention, the appellant detenu was ordered to be released on bail by the special court. The detaining authority remained oblivious as this material and vital fact of the appellant detenu being released on bail in both the cases was suppressed or rather not brought to the notice of the detaining authority by the sponsoring authority at the time of forwarding the proposal to pass the appropriate order of preventive detention,” the court said while allowing the appeal.