News Highlight
The Supreme Court observed that preventive detention is a severe invasion of personal liberty, so all safeguards allowed under the law must be followed.
The Court held that an unreasonable delay between getting a proposal and passing a detention order would invalidate the order.
Key Takeaways
- The Supreme Court observed that detention is a severe invasion of personal liberty, so all safeguards allowed under the law must be followed.
- The court made these observations as it quashed the detention order passed by the Tripura government in November 2021 and ordered the immediate release of one of the accused.
- As it was passed five months after the proposal was sent, the court quashed the order.
- Unless satisfactorily explained, the Court said that any unreasonable delay throws considerable doubt on the genuineness of the requisite subjective satisfaction of the detaining authority in passing the detention order.
- The Court also said that the question of whether the delay is unreasonable and stands unexplained depends on the facts and circumstances of each case.
Preventive detention
- There are two types of detention: punitive and preventive.
- Preventive detention is basically detention without trial in order to prevent a person from committing a crime.
- In other words, preventive detention refers to taking into custody an individual who has not committed a crime yet but the authorities believe him to be a threat to law and order.
- Punitive detention
- It is used to punish a person for an offence committed after a court trial and conviction.
Constitutional Provisions of Preventive Detention
- Article 22:
- The second part of Article 22 protects people who have been arrested or detained under a preventive detention law.
- This protection is available to both citizens and aliens.
Features of detention provision
- A person’s detention cannot be extended beyond three months unless the advisory board reports sufficient cause for such an extension. The board will be made up of high court judges.
- The person being detained should be informed of the reasons for his or her detention. However, facts deemed to be in the public interest must not be disclosed.
- The person detained should be given the opportunity to appeal against the detention order.
The 44th Amendment Act of 1978
- The 44th Amendment Act of 1978 reduced the period of detention without obtaining an advisory board’s opinion from three to two months.
- However, because this provision has not yet been implemented, the original three-month period remains in effect.
Supreme Court on Preventive Detention
- AK Gopalan v. State of Madras:
- The first case to come before the Supreme Court was AK Gopalan v. the State of Madras, in which the Court upheld the validity of the Preventive Detention Act.
- Moreover, the Court also held that Article 22 of the Constitution also provides exhaustive procedural safeguards with respect to preventive detention.
- Therefore, the Court said that fundamental rights were not violated by the impugned act because it met all the procedural safeguards that are provided in Article 22(5).
- Ram Manohar Lohia v. the State of Bihar
- The Supreme Court attempted to distinguish between the concepts of “security of the state,” “public order,” and “law and order.”
Pic Courtesy: Indian Express
Content Source: The Hindu