JUDGMENT

SUMEET GOEL, J.

The concept of personal liberty is the bedrock of a constitutional democracy, a primordial right so inextricably linked to human dignity, that one cannot conceive of meaningful existence in its absence. It is neither a gift of the state nor a creature of the codified statutes, rather it is a pre-political and inherent attribute of humanity that the law merely seeks to recognize and fortify. The antiquity of this reverence is evidenced by the fact that as early as 13^th Century, long before the contemporary lexicon of human rights was articulated, Clause 39 of Magna Carta (1215) decreed that no free man shall be disseised of his liberties save by the per legem terrae, i.e. the law of land, relevant whereof (translated version) reads thus:

“No free man is to be arrested, or imprisoned, or disseised, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any other way ruined, nor will we go against him or send against him, except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land.”

The recognition of and protection of this first freedom acts as the very marrow of a legal system, the maturity whereof, is fathomed by the vehemence and zeal with which it stands as a sentinel on the qui vive to protect the inalienable sanctity of personal freedom. A legal system governed by the Rule of Law, attains its full stature only when it recognizes libertas est res inestimabilis i.e. liberty is a thing beyond all price. Indeed, the protection of one’s personhood from unlawful restraint is a duty so sacred that it transcends the ordinary business of courts. Highlighting this judicial imperative, Lord Denning in his seminal work, Freedom under the Law (1949) recorded a venerable rule of practice: that whenever a cause concerning the personal freedom is espoused, the judge must cast aside all other temporal matters to afford it an immediate hearing. The relevant excerpt from Freedom under the Law (1949) reads thus:

“Let me start with an instance of how the courts approach the subject. Whenever one of the King's judges takes his seat, there is one application which by long tradition has priority over all others. Counsel has but to say ' My Lord, I have an application which concerns the liberty of the subject ' and forthwith the judge will put all other matters aside and hear it. It may be an application for a writ of habeas corpus, or an application for bail, but, whatever form it takes, it is heard first. This is of course only a matter of procedure, but the English law respecting the freedom of the individual has been built up from the procedure of the courts : and this simple instance of priority in point of time contains within it the fundamental principle that, where there is any conflict between the freedom of the individual and any other rights or interests, then no matter how great or powerful those others may be, the freedom of the humblest citizen shall prevail over it.”

Whenever the monolithic overreach or arbitrary high-handedness of a State instrumentality, infringing upon the sanctity of personal liberty or culminating in an unlawful/extra-legal restraint, is brought to judicial notice, the same must be subjected to exacting scrutiny. An age old adage, which met with approval from the Hon’ble Supreme Court, reads thus:

“2. Albert Schweitzer, highlighting on Glory of Life, pronounced with conviction and humility, "the reverence of life offers me my fundamental principle on morality". The aforesaid expression may appear to be an individualistic expression of a great personality, but, when it is understood in the complete sense, it really denotes, in its conceptual essentiality, and connotes, in its macrocosm, the fundamental perception of a thinker about the respect that life commands. The reverence of life is insegragably associated with the dignity of a human being who is basically divine, not servile. A human personality is endowed with potential infinity and it blossoms when dignity is sustained. The sustenance of such dignity h