GIRHARI LAL Vs. DISTRICT MAGISTRATE SHAHJEHANPUR

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This writ petition is directed against an order of District Magistrate, Shahjahanpur dated 19/04/1994 for detaining the petitioner under Section 3(1) of the Prevention of Black-marketing and maintenance of Supplies of Essential Commodities Act, 1980 (hereinafter referred to as the Act for the sake of brevity).

(2.) The learned counsel for the petitioner has urged in support of the writ petition that from a perusal of the grounds of detention furnished to the petitioner, vide Annuxure-3, it will appear that on the basis of two incidents, that are said to have taken place on 19/01/1992 and 1/03/1994. The District Magistrate felt satisfied that it was necessary to detain the petitioner under Section 3(1) of the Act. It is stated that the incidence of 19/01/1992 is not proximate and cannot constitute a reasonable basis for forming subjective satisfaction with regard to the detention of the petitioner. If that incident is excluded out of consideration, it cannot be predicted that the District Magistrate would have felt satisfied regarding the detention of the petitioner on the basis of the sole incident of 1/03/1994. The contention of the learned counsel is that in that case the whole of the detention order in question must be held to be invalid. Learned counsel has pointed out that in the Act, there is no provision analogous to Section 5A of the National Security Act, which was inserted by amendment in order to enable the detention order to be sustained on any one of the grounds, even if other grounds are held to be invalid and are liable to be excluded. The learned counsel has also submitted that the facts relating to the incident of 1/03/1994, mentioned in the ground of detention are verbatim reproduction of the facts as narrated in the police report and since they are a mechanical reproduction of the relevant facts, they would indicate a non-application of mind on the part of the detaining authority and on that ground also the impugned detention order would be liable to be quashed. Apart from these contentions, the learned counsel for the petitioner has also urged that the petitioner has been deprived of his constitutional right of making a representation to the Central Government against the impugned order, inasmuch as he was not informed by the detaining authority that he has a right to make a representation to the Central Government and no opportunity was afforded to the petitioner to exercise that right. In support of his contentions, the learned counsel for the petitioner has referred to a large volume of case law.

(3.) The learned Government Advocate has refuted the arguments raised on behalf of the petitioner and has urged that the impugned order is perfectly legal and valid. He has also referred to the fact that the cases which have given rise to the incidents, referred to above, leading up to the passing of the impugned order, involved lacs of rupees and in view of the magnitude of the case, the satisfaction of the District Magistrate with regard to the detention of the petitioner was perfectly justified and should not be lightly interfered with. The learned Government Advocate has also referred to certain authorities in support of this contention.