PRABHUDAS TRIBHAVANDAS SANGHVI Vs. STATE OF MAHARASHTRA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) PETITIONER No 1 claims to be a personal friend and political colleague of the detenu, petitioner No 2. This petition under Article 226 of the Constitution was originally filed by petitioner No. 1. In the course of the hearing an application was made ,by petitioner No. 2 herself for leave to implead her as petitioner No 2. The said application has already been granted.

(2.) AN order of detention was passed against petitioner No. 2 on 26th June, 1975. On the same date, another order was passed directing her to be detained as Class I Security Prisoner. This detention order has subsequently been reviewed and approved by the Government on 5-71975. Petitioner No. 2, however, was not actually arrested till 21st December, 1975. She was arrested in Bombay on that day. under the order of the Governor dated 22nd December, 1975. She was directed to be detained in Akola jail, Actuall she was lodged in Akola Jail on 2512-1975. It appears that petitioner No. 1 interviewed her on 5-1-1976. Petitioner No. 1 filed this petition on 7-1-1976 challenging, not the legality of the detention, but the choice of the jail in which the detenu is at present lodged. In this petition several circumstances are pleaded to show that her detention in Akola jail in the peculiar circumstances, is mala fide and virtually amounts to a punitive detention. Among other things, it is indicated that she was the only political detenu in that jail and that a leper and a lunatic were lodged therein just in front of her room and no facilities were available in the said jail for any woman prisoner, apart from several other inconveniences. She was virtually suffering solitary confinement in the absence of the company of other detenus or any political prisoner. It is prayed that the detenu be transferred to Yerawada Prison or Nasik jail, where several other detenus including women detenus are detained and where detenu's father and only daughter residing in Bombay can conveniently interview her in accordance with the Rules,

(3.) WHEN this petition was placed for admission before a Division Bench of this Court, rule nisi was issued and made returnable on 14th January, 1976. It appears that the Government in the meanwhile transferred petitioner No. 2 from Akola jail to Dhulia jail. An affidavit is sworn by one Mokashi, Desk Officer, Home Department, on 13th January, 1976, affirming that she was so transferred from Akola to District Prison, Dhulia, under order dated 8-1-1976. It was suggested that the petition did not survive any more, allegation in regard to inconvenience in Akola prison having become entirely irrelevant.