Excelsior Correspondent
Srinagar, May 18: High Court quashed five detention orders passed under Public Safety Act and directed the release of detenues.
Justice Sanjay Dhar quashed the PSA of Rayees Ahmad Lone of Ganderbal, Nayeem Ahmad Khan of Srinagar. Justice M A Chowdhary quashed the PSA of Mumtaz Ahmad Mir of Baramulla, Saleem Mushtaq Beigh of Baramulla and Division Bench of Chief Justice Arun Palli and Justice Rajnesh Oswal quashed the PSA of Bahaar Nabi Mir of Baramulla.
Lone was subjected to preventive detention on the occasion of Shri Amarnathji Yatra last year. “Since the Yatra period is over long back, therefore, the reason for keeping the petitioner in preventive detention has vanished by now, thereby rendering the need for petitioner’s preventive detention unnecessary”, Justice Dhar said.
Khan was detained on grounds of detention that he was bound down in terms of Section 126/170 of BNSS on 23.04.2025, and he was released on furnishing personal bonds but there is nothing on record to show that the respondents have either taken any steps to proceed against the petitioner for having committed breach of the bond executed by him in the aforesaid proceedings.
“Therefore, it cannot be stated that the respondents were justified in passing the impugned order of detention. The respondents should have taken requisite steps for proceeding against the petitioner for violation of the bond executed by him instead of placing him in custody under the law of preventive detention, which is not the appropriate remedy”, Justice Dhar said.
In the case of Mir, Justice Chowdhary said the grounds of detention are vague and lacking in material particulars, and the constitutional safeguards available to the detenue have also been violated due to non-supply of relevant material relied upon by the detaining authority.
In Beigh’s case, the court said the record produced by the respondents also reveals that the representation was disposed of casually without proper consideration of the grounds raised therein. “Consideration of representation against preventive detention is not an empty formality. The authority concerned is under constitutional obligation to consider the representation independently, expeditiously and meaningfully”, reads the judgment.
The Division Bench has set aside the judgment of writ court whereby the PSA of Mir was upheld by recording that the issues noticed and discussed have not been adequately addressed and, in fact, have escaped the attention of the writ Court.
“Resultantly, orders of detention, issued by the District Magistrates concerned being unsustainable in law are, accordingly, quashed. The detenues shall be released forthwith, if not required in connection with any other case”, the court directed.
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