KAMAL NARAIN KAPOOR Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) DAYA Shankar Kapoor (hereinafter referred as the detenu) was arrested and detained under the Maintenance of Internal Security Act, 1971 (hereinafter called the MISA) on 24.9.1974 by the District Magistrate, Delhi, which order was quashed in Cr. Writ 37 of 1974 by a Division Bench of this Court (consisting of Tatachari and Ansari, JJ.) reported in ILR (1975) Delhi 492. On 4.2.1975 he was arrested and detained by the Delhi Administration under the Conservation of Foreign Exchange and Prevention of Smuggling Activities Act, 1974 (hereinafter called the COFEPOSA), which order was quashed in Cr. Writ 12 of 1975 by a Division Bench of this Court (consisting of Prakash Narain and Ansari, JJ.) on 8.5.1975 (copy of the said order is Annexure -G to this petition). After the COFEPOSA was amended by an Ordinance (later Act of 1975) the detenu was again arrested and detained by an order passed by the Ministry of Finance on 1.7.1975. But the declaration under Section 12 -A of the COFEPOSA was only made on 11.7.1975. The present petition was filed in this court on 1.8.1975. On account of the challenge to the validity of the declaration made after a lapse of ten days the order of detention, passed on 1.7.1975, was revoked and a fresh order of arrest along with the fresh declaration was made on 1.9.1975. Subsequently the petitioner filed an additional affidavit challenging the orders of detention dated 1.9.1975 in which some of the attacks made on the constitutional validity on the statutory amendment to the COFEPOSA, the Constitution (Thirty -Eighth) Amendment etc. were given up; questions pertaining to the said order having been made mala fide and in violation of the provisions of the Act have alone been argued.

(2.) MR . Frank Anthony, learned counsel for the petitioner, has put forward the following contentions :

(3.) BEFORE discussing the contentions put forward on behalf of the detenu it is necessary to refer briefly to a few salient facts and the nature of the grounds which had been communicated to the detenu in connection with his two detentions by orders dated 24.9.1974 and 4.2.1975.