The main legal point established in the judgment is that preventive detention should be based on a reasonable prognosis of the person's future behavior, with a focus on the proximity in time between past activities and the detention order, and the need for a rational nexus between the incidents relied on and the time of recording of the satisfaction.

JUDGMENT

Pankaj Mithal, CJ. - The petitioner-appellant Jahangir Ahmad Bhat is in preventive detention. His writ petition challenging his detention has been dismissed by the learned Single Judge vide judgment and order dated 25.04.2022, hence he has preferred this appeal.

2. The petitioner is a resident of District Kupwara. He obtained education upto Middle Class and thereafter worked as a Bus Conductor and finally became a Bus Driver.

3. The petitioner-appellant and his associate Javed Ahmad Lone were apprehended on 05.04.2015 in suspicious circumstances and during search 01 Kg and 100 Gms of Charas was recovered from their possession. Accordingly, FIR No.16/2015 under Sections 8/20 and 29 of the Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1988, hereinafter for short the Act, was registered in Police Station Kralpora. In pursuance thereof investigations were conducted and finally the petitionerappellant was charge sheeted on 19.06.2011 before the court of Principal Sessions Judge, Kupwara. He was granted bail by the trial court on 30.01.2016.

4. It appears that in the aforesaid background a detention order was passed against him on 13.09.2021 by the Divisional Commissioner. The order states that he is satisfied by the record submitted by the Sr. Superintendent of Police, Kupwara, that in order to prevent the petitionerappellant from committing illegal activities within the purview of Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1988, it is necessary to detain him under Section 3 of the Act. The petitionerappellant was served with the detention order and the grounds of detention along with other relevant documents to enable him to file representation to the appropriate authorities.

5. The grounds of detention refers to the aforesaid incident on 05.04.2015 when the appellant-petitioner was found in possession of 01 Kg and 100 Gms of Charas. It states that he is working in an organized and well planned manner and committing drug trafficking causing damage to the society. Therefore, it has become necessary to put him in preventive detention. The petitioner-appellant challenged the above detention order by filing WP(Crl) No.175/2021 which has been dismissed vide the impugned judgment and order dated 25.04.2022.

6. In the writ petition the petitioner-appellant has raised various grounds such as that the detention order was not passed with independent mind or recording proper satisfaction; that he was not supplied with the material relied upon for his detention; and that he was denied proper opportunity to file an effective representation. The learned Single Judge repelled all the contentions as raised by the petitioner-appellant and dismissed the writ petition.

7. On behalf of the petitioner-appellant, Mr. M. Ashraf Wani, learned counsel, has raised two arguments before us. The first is that on the solitary incident of 2015 wherein the petitioner-appellant was released on bail on 30.06.2016, the order of preventive detention has been passed with no averment that he was involved in similar kind of activities thereafter till the date of detention; and secondly that the detention order stands vitiated for want of non-consideration of his representation.

8. We first take up the second point raised by Mr. M. Ashraf Wani, with regard to non-consideration of the representation of the petitionerappellant.

9. Mr. Sajjad Ashraf, learned GA, on the above aspect submits that the petitioner-appellant has not pleaded in the writ petition that he had made any representation to the authorities or that it has not been considered. It is for this reason that the decision of the writ court is silent in this regard.

10. Our attention was drawn by the Government Advocate to the pleadings contained in the writ petition and we are satisfied that the petitioner-appellant has not very specifically pleaded that he had submitted any representation to the Government and the same has not been considered. The petitioner-appellan