BIMLA DEVI Vs. CHATURVEDI

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Shrimati Simla Devi, aged 27 years, wife of Bagh Shah, caste Khatri, resident of Deoband Town, District Saharanpur applies under Article 226 of the Constitution of India and prays that a writ in the nature of Habeas Corpus be issued directing the police authorities, arrayed as respondents 1 to 3 to remove the police guard from the petitioner's house and not to interfere with her liberty and to prevent them from arresting or removing the petitioner to any camp or in any way interfere in her liberty of movement.

(2.) The facts of the case are few. The petitioner is a citizen of India. She was formerly a Mohammedan and Known as Razia Khatoon: She was married to one Bidayatullah Butt, Assistant Station Master Nagal, District Saharanpur, who migrated to Pakistan in the disturbances of 1947. The applicant was left behind in India. According to her even before her husband left for Pakistan, he had divorced her and married another lady and in those circumstances, she had sought the protection of one Bagh Shah Khatri, a cane contractor at Nagal station and after embracing the Arya Samajist faith had married him on 15-7-1947 and has since then been living with him. The case for the opposite parties is that the applicant was abducted from Miss Brow's Medical College at Ludhiana in June 1947. The applicant had two issues by her former husband -- a daughter aged 4 years and a son aged 10 months. The son died on December 1947. Some time later Hidayatulla Butt put forward a claim for her recovery but by compromise gave up his claim against the applicant on condition that the daughter was restored to him. Accordingly the daughter was restored to him sometime in December 1950. This was all done through private negotiations. Then, though Hidayat Ullah was satisfied with the position, the applicant's other relatives pressed for her restoration to them.

(3.) A year later in December 1951, Sri Chaturvedi Sub-Inspector D. I. S. (Opp. party no. 1) arrested the applicant at her house & wanted to remove her to a detention camp, but as she was in a highly advanced state of pregnancy she was allowed to remain at her house but a police guard was posted at her house und she was not allowed to move out. The District Magistrate (opp. party 2) refused her application for bail. She then moved the present application under Article 226 of the Constitution for the reliefs already stated.