Can’t curtail personal liberty without following the law: SC

NEW DELHI: Personal liberty is the most cherished right of an individual that cannot be taken away without procedure established by law, the Supreme Court stressed on Wednesday while setting aside a detention order.

A bench of justices Ajay Rastogi and CT Ravikumar noted that an authority passing an order under a preventive detention law must comply with all the procedural obligations since such an order curtails liberty. Article 21 of the Constitution declares that no person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to procedure established by law.

“The right of personal liberty and individual freedom, which is probably the most cherished, is not in any manner, arbitrarily to be taken away from him even temporarily without following the procedure prescribed by law,” held the bench.

The top court was hearing an appeal by the state of Manipur against a 2021 high court order quashing the detention order passed under Prevention of Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act against two persons. The high court noted that the authorities failed to supply the legible copies of the documents which were relied upon by them while passing the order of detention.

In its appeal before the Supreme Court, the state government argued that the high court judgement is not legally sustainable since they had never complained against illegible copies of the relevant documents before the detaining authority.

Countering the state’s argument, advocate Prerna Singh, who was appointed as amicus curiae by the court to assist it as the lawyer for one of the detenues, emphasised that a failure to supply legible copies of documents will denude a person of his right to make an effective representation against the detention order.

She added that Article 22(5) of the Constitution accords a right to an individual to be given at an earliest opportunity to make a representation against the order of detention and therefore, the state cannot take a simplistic plea on the detenue not complaining about illegible copies before the detaining authority.

Accepting Singh’s arguments, the top court held that refusal to supply the documents requested by the detenu or supply of illegible or blurred copies of the documents relied upon by the detaining authority amounts to violation of Article 22(5) of the Constitution.

ARTICLE 21 SAYS NO ONE SHALL BE DEPRIVED OF HIS LIFE OR PERSONAL LIBERTY EXCEPT ACCORDING TO PROCEDURE ESTABLISHED BY THE LAW