JUDGMENT

Special leave granted.

Pandharinath Laxman Waringe has been detained, by an order dated April 3, 1992, under S. 3(2) of he National Security Act, 1980 with a view to preventing him from acting in any prejudicial to the maintenance o public order. His wife Smt. Panna challenged the detention order by way of a writ petition under Art. 226 of the Constitution of before the Bombay High Court A on Bench of the High Court dismissed the writ petition by its judgment dated July 1992. This appeal by way of special leave against the judgment of the High Court.

2. The detention order is founded on four incidents which took place between June 2, 1990 and September 13, 1991. The detention order was served on the detenu on April 3, 1992 itself. The counsel for the detenu challenged the order of detention, before us, on the following grounds :-

(1) There was inordinate delay in considering the represent on of the detenu by the Central Government and as such the detenu was denied the under Art. 22(5) of the Constitution. According to the learned counsel the representation was submitted on April 24, 1992 and the rejection was communicated to him on June 15, 1992. The contention is that there is no explanation for the gross delay on the part. of the Central Government in considering the detenus representation.

(2) There has been long delay in issuing the detention order. The first ground of detention is year and five months earlier to the date of detention order. According to the learned counsel due to delay in issuing the detention order the live link was snapped and as such the detention order was not justified.

(3) There was non-application of mind on the part of the detaining authority as much as the file containing near about 200 pages including documents in Marathi was sent to him on April 3, 1992 and the same day the detention order was issued.

3. We have heard learned counsel for the parties, gone through the judgment of the High Court, read the grounds of detention and examined other relevant material on the record. The High Court, in a well reasoned judgment, has dealt with all the points raised by the learned counsel for the appellant.

4. The High Court examined the original records and came to the conclusion that there was no delay in considering the representation of the detenu by the Central Government. The High Court based its conclusions on the following reasoning :-

"The representation of the detenu is dated 24-4-1992. It was received by the jail authority on the same day. On 27-4-1992 the Jail Authority forwarded the same to the Central Government, Central Government received it on 1-5-1992. On 5-5-1992 Central Government sent a wireless message to the State Government to furnish some vital information. This vital information was received by the Central Government on 20-5-1992. After considering this vital information and the parawise comments the Central Government took decision to reject the same on 28-5-1992. The decision was communicated to the jail authority by wireless message followed by a communication dated 4-6-1992.

Mr. Gupta urged that in the first place there was delay of about 15 days on the part of the State Government or the detaining authority to forward the parawise comments. It covers the period between 5-5-1992 to 20-5-1992. He then urged that despite the receipt of the information and the parawise comments by the Central Government on 20-5-1992 it took nearly 8 days to dispose of the detenus representation which period according to the learned counsel does not reflect the expeditious disposal of the representation by the Central Government. Lastly he urged that the Home Central Government took nearly 8 days to communicate its decision and on this score also the continued detention cannot be held legal.

Mr. Ishwar Singh, Desk Officer, Ministry of Home Affairs has filed the return on behalf of Union of India. In paragraph 6, it has been stated that on receipt of the representation on 1-5-1992 it was immediate