Preventive detention orders must establish a live link between the detenu's activities and the necessity for detention; vague grounds and failure to disclose bail status invalidate such orders.

JUDGMENT :

1. Through the medium of this petition, the petitioner seeks quashment of Order no.DMB/PSA/01 of 2024 dated 01.01.2024, passed by District Magistrate, Budgam– respondent no.2, whereby detenu, namely, Showkat Ahmad Ganie @ Naaz S/o Late Mohammad Kamal Ganie R/o Sheikhpora Wathoora Tehsil Chadoora District Budgam, has been placed under preventive detention with a view to prevent him from acting in any manner prejudicial to security of the State, precisely on the grounds that there is no live link between the last activity and the impugned order of detention inasmuch as in the FIR no.116/2022 P/S Chadoora, detenu was already discharged, but this important fact has not been reflected in grounds of detention and besides that detenu was already admitted to bail in the cases mentioned in grounds of detention but this important fact has not been mentioned in grounds of detention.

2. Respondents have filed the reply affidavit, insisting therein that the activities indulged in by detenu are highly prejudicial to the security of the State and, therefore, his remaining at large is a threat to the security of the State. The activities narrated in the grounds of detention have been reiterated in the reply/counter affidavit filed by respondents. The factual averments that detenu was not supplied with relevant material relied upon in the grounds of detention have been refuted. It is insisted that all the relevant material, which has been relied upon by the detaining authority, was provided to the detenu at the time of execution of warrant.

3. I have heard learned counsel for parties. I have gone through the detention record attached with the file and considered the matter.

4. The case set up by the petitioner in the petition is that the detenu was arrested in connection with case FIR No.116/2022 in the year 2022. He was put to trial and by order dated 04.10.2023, passed by Additional Sessions Judge, Budgam, detenu was discharged of offences and released from custody. Detenu was once again called to police station Chadoora in the month of January 2024, where he was detained and thereafter shifted to Central Jail, Kotebhalwal, Jammu, to be detained under and in terms of impugned order of detention.

5. The detaining authority is stated to have relied upon various FIRs, without mentioning in grounds of detention that detenu has been admitted to bail in those cases. The last

6. The question whether the prejudicial activities of a person requiring to pass a detention order is proximate to time when the order is made or the live-link between the prejudicial activities and the purpose of detention is snapped, depends on the facts and circumstances of each case. Nonetheless, when there is an undue and long delay between the prejudicial activities and the passing of the detention order, the court has to scrutinise whether the detaining authority has satisfactorily examined such a delay and afforded a tenable and reasonable explanation as to why such a delay has occasioned, when called upon to answer and further the court has to investigate whether the casual connection has been broken in the circumstances of each case. Certainly, in the present case, there is no cogent explanation coming to fore from perusal of the grounds of detention with reference to the live-link between the prejudicial activities and the purpose of the detention and resultantly the impugned detention order is liable to be quashed. In this regard reference is made to the law laid down in T. A. Abdul Rahman v. State of Kerala (1989) 4 SCC 741 and Rajinder