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Patna High Court · body

1967 DIGILAW 16 (PAT)

Gaya Singh v. State Of Bihar

1967-02-13

K.K.DUTTA, RAMRATNA SINGH

body1967
Judgment 1. This writ petition under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India arises out of an order purporting to be passed by the District Magistrate of Patna under Sub-section (2) of Sec.3 of the Preventive Detention Act, 1950 , directing the detention of the petitioner with a view to preventing him from acting in a manner prejudicial to the security of the State and maintenance of public order. The petitioner is the President of the Bihar State Students Federation and it appears that he was at first arrested on 7-12-1966 in connection with four cases of Gardanibagh Police Station and seven cases of Patna Kotwali Police Station, which have been specified in paragraph 2 of the petition. He was granted bail by the Subdivisional Magistrate of Patna Sadar in all the cases except one of the Gardanibagh P. S. cases in which he was granted bail by the Sessions Judge of Patna. After some delay in verification of the bail bonds, he was released from jail on 1-2-1967, but was re-arrested at the jail gate on the same day as per detention order dated 30-1-1967 passed by the District Magistrate under the Preventive Detention Act. A copy of the detention order, as embodied in Annexure A of the petition, was duly served upon the petitioner and, subsequently, he was also served with the statement of grounds of the detention order and the same has been annexed to the supplementary affidavit filed by the petitioner on 7-2-1967. The correctness of some of the facts stated in the statement of grounds supplied to the petitioner hap been denied by him and the other grounds are alleged by him to be vague and irrelevant. A further allegation was made by him to the effect that as he had been working against the Chief Minister, Shri K.B. Sahay, who is a candidate from Patna West Assembly Constituency in the coming General Elections, and the Bihar State Students Federation had decided to work against Congress candidates and specially against Shri K.B. Sahay, this was the cause of the wrath of the Chief Minister against the petitioner as well as other students and their leaders and the order in question had been issued at the Instance and for the electoral benefit of the Chief Minister Shri K.B. Sahay. 2. 2. In the counter-affidavit, filed on behalf of the respondents, the allegations about the aforesaid act of the petitioner and the decision of the Students Federation having caused wrath to the Chief Minister against the petitioner and other students and their leaders and the detention order having been issued at the instance and for the electoral benefit of Shri K.B. Sahay has been denied. The allegation regarding vagueness of the grounds have also been denied and some matters referred to in the supplementary affidavit filed by the petitioner have been referred to as being irrelevant. It was conceded on behalf of the petitioner that as the allegations as to the detention order being mala fide in fact and having been issued at the instance and for the electoral benefit of Shri K.B. Sahay are denied, it is not necessary to enter into this question We are, therefore, only concerned with the question as to whether the detention order has been validly made in accordance with law. For this purpose, it is necessary to mention in detail the ground supplied to the petitioner on basis of which the detention order in question was passed by the District Magistrate of Patna. These grounds are as follows: "1. You are a general Secretary of S.F.R. and also General Secretary of the United Students Front. 2. You are a prominent leader of the students agitation. Due to your efforts and that of your followers. United Students Front comprising of S.F.R., S.F.L Samajwadi Yuyajan Sabha. Progressive Students Union (PSU). Bihar Rajya Chhatra Kalyan Samiti and representatives of the Patna University Students Union was formed. The first convention of this United Students Front was held at Patna on 22-11-66. This convention gave a call of general strike in all the educational institutions on 9-12-66. While addressing the delegates you said that the Government was aiming to crush the students agitation but the Government should realise that the students would overthrow the Government. 3. On 27-11-66 a meeting of the State Executive Committee of the United Students Front was held at Patna. In this meeting you were assigned the job of organising the students for the purposes of staging demonstration, organising processions and rally throughout the State for the fulfilment of their demands etc. 3. On 27-11-66 a meeting of the State Executive Committee of the United Students Front was held at Patna. In this meeting you were assigned the job of organising the students for the purposes of staging demonstration, organising processions and rally throughout the State for the fulfilment of their demands etc. On 25-11-67 you addressed the students meeting at Samastipur in which you said that in case the Chief Minister fails to fulfil the demands of the students, the students would so on strike. 4. On 1-12-66 you addressed an open meeting of the Chhatra Sangh at Muzaffarpur. You advised the students not to allow any of the Ministers to address public meetings in case their processions and meeting were not allowed due to promulgation of order Under Sec.144 Cr.P.C. You also advised the students individually to act as leader in case the leaders were arrested. The present students unrest and agitation is mainly due to your instigation and that of your fellow workers. You instigate the students and also the members of the public to resort to subversive activities which are prejudicial to the security of the State and maintenance of the public order. 3. It is unnecessary to refer to all the decisions on the subject, for it is now well settled by various decisions of the Supreme Court including the decision in Naresh Chandra Ganguli V/s. State of West Bengal, AIR 1959 SC 1335 that under Clause (5) of Article 22 of the Constitution, a person against whom a detention order is passed, has two distinct, though interrelated, rights namely, (i) right to be informed of the grounds on which the order of detention has been made and (ii) right to be enabled at the earliest opportunity to make a representation against the order. The grounds which have rational connection with the objects mentioned in Sec.3 of the Act have to be supplied to the petitioner and as soon as that is done, the first condition of valid detention is complied with. The second condition of such detention is fulfilled only after the detenu is supplied with such information as will enable him to make a representation. The second condition of such detention is fulfilled only after the detenu is supplied with such information as will enable him to make a representation. Therefore, if there is infringement of either the two rights and any of the conditions precedent to the valid detention, as aforesaid, has not been fulfilled, the detenu has a right to approach Court for a writ in the nature of habeas corpus. It is also well settled that the satisfaction of the detaining authority to which Sec.3(1)(a) refers is his subjective satisfaction and so it is not justiciable. It is, therefore, not open to the Court to consider the question as to whether the said satisfaction of the detaining authority can be justified by the application of objective tests. The reasonableness of the satisfaction of the detaining authority can-not be questioned in a Court of law; the adequacy of the material on which the said satisfaction purports to rest also cannot be examined in a Court of law (Vide AIR 1964 SC 334 , Rameshwar Shaw v. District Magistrate, Burdwan). It is also well settled, however, that if any of the grounds furnished to the detenu are found to be irrelevant while considering the application of Clauses (i) to (iii) of Sec.3(1)(a) and in that sense are foreign to the Act, the satisfaction of the detaining authority on which the order of detention is based Is open to challenge and the detention order is liable to be quashed. Similarly, if some of the grounds supplied to the detenu are so vague that they would virtually deprive the detenu of his statutory right of making a representation, that may again introduce a serious infirmity in the order of detention. If, however, the grounds on which the order of detention proceeds are relevant and germane to the matters which fall to be considered under Sec.3(1)(a), it would not be open to the detenu to challenge the order of detention by arguing that the satisfaction of the detaining authority is not reasonably based on any of the said grounds (Vide the aforesaid case of Rameshwar Shaw, AIR 1964 SC 334 ). The only other case to which reference may be made is the case of Dwarka Das Bhatia V/s. State of Jammu and Kashmir, AIR 1957 SC 184. After referring to the earlier decision of the Supreme Court in Dr. The only other case to which reference may be made is the case of Dwarka Das Bhatia V/s. State of Jammu and Kashmir, AIR 1957 SC 184. After referring to the earlier decision of the Supreme Court in Dr. Ram Krishan Bhardwaj V/s. State of Delhi, AIR 1953 SC 318 and Shibban Lal Saksena V/s. State of U.P., AIR 1954 SC 179 , the following observations were made in this cases :- "The principle underlying all these decisions is this: where power is vested in a statutory authority to deprive the liberty of a subject on its subjective satisfaction with reference to specified matters, if that satisfaction is stated to be based on a number of grounds or for a variety of reasons, all taken together, and if some out of them are found to be nonexistent or irrelevant the very exercise of that power is bad. That is so because the matter being one for subjective satisfaction, it must be properly based on all the reasons on which it purports to be based. If some out of them are found to be non-existent or Irrelevant, the Court cannot predicate what the subjective satisfaction of the said authority would have been on the exclusion of those grounds or reasons. To uphold the validity of such an order in spite of the invalidity of some of the reasons or grounds would be to substitute the objective standards of the Court for the subjective satisfaction of the statutory authority. In applying these principles, however, the Court must be satisfied that the vague or irrelevant grounds are such as, if excluded might reasonably have affected the subjective satisfaction of the appropriate authority. It is not merely because some ground or reason of a comparatively unessential nature is defective that such an order based on subjective satisfaction can be held to be invalid. The court while anxious to safeguard the personal liberty of the individual will not lightly interfere with such order. It is in the light of these principles that the validity of the impugned order has to be judged." 4. Bearing these principles in mind we have to consider whether the detention order is a valid one in view of the statement of grounds supplied to the petitioner. It is in the light of these principles that the validity of the impugned order has to be judged." 4. Bearing these principles in mind we have to consider whether the detention order is a valid one in view of the statement of grounds supplied to the petitioner. In para No. 1, it is mentioned that the petitioner is the General Secretary of S.P.R. and also the United Students Front and in paragraph 2 it is alleged that he is a prominent leader of the students agitation and due to his efforts and efforts of his followers, United Students Front comprising of S. F.R.S. F.L. Samajwadi Yuvajan Sabha, Progressive Students Union (RSP). Bihar Rajya Chhatra Kalyan Samiti etc. was formed and the first convention of this United Students Front was held at Patna on 26-11-1966, which convention gave a call of general strike in all the educational institutions on 9-12-1966. One of the grounds stated in paragraph 3 was that on 27-11-1966, a meeting of the State Executive Committee of the United Students Front was held at Patna, in which the petitioner was assigned the job of organising the students for the purpose of staging demonstration, organising processions and rally throughout the State for the fulfilment of their demands. In Paragraphs 4 and 5 of the supplementary affidavit of the petitioner, there is a specific allegation to the effect that there does not exist any organisation called United Students Front and the petitioner is not the secretary of any such organisation and that no meeting of any executive committee of such an organisation was held on 27-11-1966. The Respondents have not challenged these statements, as made in paras 4 and 5 of the supplementary affidavit and have merely stated in their counter affidavit that the matters mentioned in paragraphs 4 and 5 of the supplementary affidavit are irrelevant. It would thus appear that the correctness of the assertion made in the supplementary affidavit about non-existence of any organisation known as United Students Front and as to the petitioner being not a Secretary of any such organisation and about there having been no meeting of any excutive committee of such an organisation on 27-11-1966 stands uncontroverted. It was, however, contended by Mr. It was, however, contended by Mr. Sarwar Ali on behalf of the Respondents that it is not for this Court to consider whether any of the grounds are non-existent and it should proceed on the basis that such grounds had been placed for consideration before the District Magistrate when he passed the order in question. This contention, however, is quite unacceptable for if the ground on which the order of detention purports to be passed is non-existent in fact, the very foundation on which the order is based stands demolished. As held in the case of AIR 1957 S.C. 164 , referred to above, if some out of the grounds are found to be non-existent or irrelevant, the Court cannot predicate what the subjective satisfaction of ;he detaining authority would have been on the exclusion of those grounds or reasons and to uphold the validity of such an order in spite of the invalidity of some of the reasons or grounds would be to substitute the objective standards of the Court for the subjective satisfaction of the statutory authority. It would thus follow that the order in question is vitiated due to non-existence of some of the grounds on basis of which the order has been passed. Again, it may also be noted that trying to organise meetings, processions and hartals so long as such act is not declared unlawful and there is no allegation of use of violence in exercise of such acts, or incitament to violence the question of disturbance of public order or security of the State does not arise. Hence any call for hartal of the students or staging demonstration or organising procession or rally for the purpose of meeting their grievances, if any, are irrelevant to the question of security of the State or maintenance of public order unless there was any incitment to any unlawful act or violence . The grounds, as stated in the whole of paragraph 3 of the statement of grounds, were thus quite irrelevant. 5. In the last part of paragraph 2 of the grounds, it was, no doubt, mentioned that the petitioner had addressed the delegates on 22-11-1966 in the convention of the United Students Front that the Government was aiming to crush the students agitation but the Government should realise that the students would overthrow the Government. 5. In the last part of paragraph 2 of the grounds, it was, no doubt, mentioned that the petitioner had addressed the delegates on 22-11-1966 in the convention of the United Students Front that the Government was aiming to crush the students agitation but the Government should realise that the students would overthrow the Government. Apart from the fact that the existence of the United Students Front itself has been denied and the denial stands uncontroverted, it may also be mentioned that in a democratic State every citizen has a right to express and spread disaffection against a particular party Government, so long as no violence or illegal act is preached or instigated. It would thus appear that all the grounds as mentioned in paragraphs 1 to 3 are either non-existent or irrelevant 6. Coming now to the last paragraph of the statement of grounds, the allegations in the first part of this paragraph cannot be said to be either vague or irrelevant. But the last part of the paragraph in which it is mentioned that the petitioner instigated the students as also members of the public to resort to subversive activities which were prejudicial to the security of the State and maintenance of the public order is quite vague in view of the absence of any particulars as to when and where any such instigation either to the students or members of the public was made or what was the nature of the subversive activities for committing which instigation was given. This evidently constituted the most serious allegation against the petitioner which had direct bearing on the question of security of State or maintenance of public order and in view of the vagueness of this allegation, it is evidently not possible for the petitioner to make any proper representation, as contemplated by Section 7. 7. It is apparent from the considerations set forth above that the subjective satisfaction of the detaining authority has been based mainly on grounds which are either non-existent or irrelevant or vague and, as such, the impugned order of detention is altogether illegal and invalid. 8. In the result, the petition is allowed. The detention order passed against the petitioner is quashed and he is directed to be released forthwith.