IMPORTANT POINT
Inordinate delays in detention orders can invalidate them if they sever the link between the grounds for detention and the purpose of detention.

ORDER :

S.M. Subramaniam, J.

[PRAYER: Habeas Corpus Petition is filed under Article 226 of the Constitution of India for issuance of a Writ of Habeas Corpus, to call for the records in Connection with the order of Detention passed by the 2nd respondent dated 08.05.2024 in C.No.36/G/IS/TIRUPPUR City/2024 against the petitioner son GAWASKAR @ GAWASKI, M/38 Years, Son of Annadurai, who is confined at Central Prison, Coimbatore and set aside the same and consequently direct the respondents to produce the detenue before the Court and set him at liberty.]

The petitioner herein is the mother of the detenu viz., Gawaskar @ Gawaski, Male aged 38 Years, Son of Annadurai, now confined at Central Prison, Coimbatore, has come forward with this Habeas Corpus Petition challenging the detention order passed by the 2nd respondent in C.No.36/G/IS/TIRUPPUR City/2024 dated 08.05.2024.

2. The two adverse cases of the year 2023 has been relied on for the purpose of detaining the detenu under Act 14 of 1982.

3. The Detaining Authority furnished the reasons stating that the detenu has been lodged at Central Prison, Coimbatore as a remand prisoner in Crime No.142 of 2024 and he has not moved bail in any Court so far. Even in the absence of bail application, the Detaining Authority formed an opinion that there is real possibility of coming out on bail in the future in the above case by filing bail application before the Court concerned.

4. Such futuristic presumption of the Detaining Authority must have certain link or proximity and in the absence of any such proximity, the Court has to draw an inference. The Detaining Authority has failed to consider the relevant material available on record for the purpose of invoking act 14 of 1982. Preventive measures can be taken only in the presence of concrete materials and the presumptions based on certain remote instances or old cases would be insufficient for the purpose of branding a person as “Goonda”.

5. In the present case, though the learned Additional Public Prosecutor states that several other cases are pending. Those cases were registered in the year 2010, 2011, 2014 and 2018, which shall have no proximity with the detention order passed in the year 2024.

6. In such circumstances, the Police Authorities is at liberty to move application for cancellation of bail in the event of grant of bail by the Courts. In alternate, they can seek to impose stringent conditions and enhance surveillance of such accused persons, so as to prevent them from committing offences frequently.

7. Instead of initiating all appropriate alternate measures, the authorities cannot invoke preventive detention law in a casual manner merely on the ground that there is a likelihood of causing breach of public order. The breach of public order has to be established with the relevant materials and in the absence, Court has no option but to interfere.

8. Though several grounds are raised in the petition, the learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that there is an inordinate delay in passing the order of detention.

9. In the instant case, the detenu was arrested on 08.03.2024 and thereafter, the detention order came to be passed on 08.05.2024. This fact is not disputed by the learned Additional Public Prosecutor.

10. In the case of Sushanta Kumar Banik vs. State of Tripura, 2022 LiveLaw (SC) 813, when there was an inordinate delay from the date of proposal till passing of the detention order and likewise, between the date of detention order and the actual arrest, the Hon'ble Supreme Court had held that the live and proximate link, between the grounds and the purpose of detention, stands snapped in arresting the detenu. The relevant observation of the Hon'ble Supreme Court is extracted hereunder :

“20. It is manifestly clear from a conspectus of the above decisions of this Court, that the underlying principle is that if there is unreasonable delay between the date of the order of detention & actual arrest of the detenu and in the same manner fro