( 1 ) THE petitioner in this writ petition under Art. 226 of the Constitution of India has prayed for a writ of certiorari for quashing the detention order dated 23-6-1998 passed by the District Magistrate, Surendranagar under Sec. 2 (c) of the Gujarat Prevention of Anti-Social Activities Act (for short pasa) and for a writ of habeas corpus for immediate release of the petitioner from illegal detention.

( 2 ) IT appears from the grounds of detention as contained in Annexure "b" that the Detaining Authority considered the five registered cases under various sections of the I. P. C. which are pending trial before the competent Court and also considered the statements of the nine confidential witnesses and from the aforesaid material he arrived at subjective satisfaction that the petitioner is dangerous person within the meaning of Sec. 2 (c) of the PASA. Accordingly, the impugned order of detention was passed which is under challenge in this writ petition only on two grounds.

( 3 ) THE first ground of attack is that the provisions of Art. 22 (5) of the constitution of India have been violated inasmuch as the Detaining Authority in the grounds of detention has not claimed any privilege under Sec. 9 (2) of the PASA. The learned Counsel for the petitioner contended that since this privilege was net l claimed by the Detaining Authority in the grounds of detention, he was duty-bound to disclose the names and addresses of the nine confidential witnesses and was also duty-bound to supply the entire statements of the confidential witnesses and since this was not done, safeguards provided under Art. 22 (5) of the Constitution of India were violated on account of which the detention and continued detention of the petitioner has been rendered illegal.

( 4 ) THE learned Assistant Government Pleader on the other hand contended that the privilege was claimed by the Detaining Authority for which he has made reference to paras 4 and 13 of the counter-affidavit. The point for consideration at this stage is what is requirement of Art. 22 (5) of the Constitution of India. There are two basic requirements of this Article when a person is preventively detained. The first requirement is that the person detained must be made known as soon as possible of the grounds of detention and the second mandatory requirement is that the Detaining Authority must afford at the earliest opportunity of hearing which includes opportunity of making representation. These are constitutional mandates which are not discretionary, rather, these constitutional mandates have to be strictly observed. In case of non-observance of these mandates the detention order cannot to sustained.

( 5 ) IF the constitutional requirement is to supply to the detenu at the earliest the grounds of detention, it means not only the said grounds of detention but also the material upon which the grounds of detention were formulated. It further means that all the documents upon which the grounds of detention were formulated must be supplied. Since the Detaining Authority in the instant case has placed reliance upon the statements of the nine confidential witnesses, it is to be seen whether he was required to supply copies of statements of those witnesses to the petitioner or not. If those, statements were relied upon by the Detaining Authority he was duty- bound to disclose the names and addresses of the witnesses and also to supply the copies of those statements. Of course, exception is that if in public interest, disclosure of names and addresses of the witnesses was not advisable the Detaining Authority could have claimed privilege under Sec. 9 (2) of the PASA.

( 6 ) ANOTHER point for consideration at this stage is what is the stage at which such privilege can be claimed by the Detaining Authority. In my opinion, the detaining Authority has to claim this privilege in the grounds of detention enabling the detenu to know that on account of claim of privilege under Sec. 9 (2) of