Important points
" The Section does not suffer from any of the vitiating factors as are now alleged by the petitioner-Court can consider in these proceedings and it will be up to the petitioner to produce cogent and reliable evidence before the competent Authority to establish that she had not abandoned the senior citizen or that she has not left such citizen in any place with the intention of wholly abandoning her
" Any interpretation to the Section in the manner that has now been contented by the petitioner would do unpardonable assault to the very purpose for which this Act has been enacted and consequently, by no stretch of imagination can this Court grant imprimatur to any such assertions.

1. The broad grounds on which legislations and its provisions are called upon to answer constitutional validation are now fairly well laid out. The potentiality of a law being employed to misuse and to mal-application, is one among such grounds, asserts the petitioner and this Court's answer to this singular assertion would effectively obtain closure to the other legal contentions urged in this writ petition.

2. The daughter of a senior citizen has filed this writ petition assailing Section 24 of the Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act, 2007 (hereinafter referred to as “The Act” for brevity), asserting that its provisions have the wherewithal to be misused by the Competent Authority and therefore, violative of Article 14 and 21 of the Constitution of India.

3. Since the ossature on which the foundational facts are built upon by the petitioner revolves around Section 24 of the Act, it becomes necessitous to extract it as under, to enable an easy reference:

Exposure and abandonment of senior citizen:- Whoever, having the care or protection of senior citizen leaves, such senior citizen in any place with the intention of wholly abandoning such senior citizen, shall be punishable with imprisonment of either description for a term which may extend to three months or fine which may extend to five thousand rupees or with both.

4. The petitioner’s main contention, in challenge to the constitutionality of the afore Section of the Act, is that it is susceptible to being misused or misinterpreted by the Authorities under it, since it provides, allegedly without any precision, that any person having the care and protection of the senior citizen and who leaves the senior citizen in a place with an intention of abandoning him/her shall be liable to be punished with imprisonment as prescribed therein. She predicates the words ‘having care or protection of a senior citizen' is extremely vague and not amenable to an accurate definition, particularly because even the Act has not defined this phrase in any definitive manner and, consequentially, that this Section is liable to be put to gross misuse or abuse by the Authorities under the Act.

5. Before I endeavor to obtain answers to the challenge pitched by the petitioner in this writ petition, I deem it necessary to place on record a few very essential facts that must guide my views in this judgment.

6. The petitioner admits to be the daughter of the senior citizen involved in this case and that her mother, the senior citizen, died in an old-age home. According to the petitioner, she is married and she is living with her family in Ooty and therefore, that she was physically incapable of taking care of her mother during her lifetime; but that she had been offering her all support, pecuniarily as also through other methods, and thus that she had always taken care of her adequately. She asserts that this being so, subsequent to her mother's death, the Police Authorities have now initiated action under Section 24 of the Act, on the basis of an alleged report of the concerned Social Welfare Officer, to prosecute the petitioner as well as her siblings, for allegedly having abandoned their mother in an old-age home, finally leading to her death.

7. The petitioner contends that she is not liable for any action under the mandate of Section 24 of the Act because she did not have the care and protection of her mother while she was alive. This rather astounding submission is made by her adding that only a person having the de-facto physical custody of the senior citizen can be proceeded against under this Section and not any other person, even if such person is dejure obligated to take care and offer protection to the senior citizen. After saying so, the petitioner proceeds to assert that since the words ‘having the care or protection of the senior citizen’ in Section 24 is, according to her, imprecise and incapable of any specific meaning, it is vitiated by the vice of vagueness an