RANJIT SINGH Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) PETITIONER Ranjit Singh was arrested on 25-11-1987 in case F.I.R. No. 170 of Police Station Dhuri and while he was under detention in District Jail, Patiala, detention order annexure P- I dated 1-2-1986 i.e. after 2-1/4 months of his arrest was passed by District Magistrate, Sangrur, who is respondent No. 2 herein, under section 3(2) of the National Security Act, 1980. Detention order is admittedly based on the solitary incident with regard to which the above referred to case was registered. Through present writ petition. the said detention order has been challenged by detainee petitioner.

(2.) IT is raid in the detention order that the petitioner was likely to indulge in prejudicial activities on account of his propensity towards such activities which are prejudicial to the maintenance of public order and security of the State. Same is the stand taken by the respondents in their replies to the writ petition. There, however, does not appear to be any justification for such presumption. Propensity towards prejudicial activities can only be gathered from continuity of actions and single instance can never be treated to be sufficient -to draw such an inference. It is clear from the grounds of detention (translation annexure P-2) as well as reply of respondent No. 2 that supporting material on which the grounds of detention were based was only FIR No. 170 dated 25-11-1987 and there was no other activity whatsoever which might have supplied such material. The inference. drawn against the petitioner with regard to propensity towards prejudicial activity thus was not justified so as to call for detention under National Security Act.

(3.) IN any case,, it must appear from the order that the same was passed after application of mind taking all the facts and circumstances into consideration. In this case, however, from the material placed before me, it appears that application of mind by the authority making the detention order was badly lacking. Although it is admitted in the detention order that at the time of its making petitioner was in custody in District Jail Patiala, any steps taken by him to get himself released have not been spelt out therein. Further on the one hand it is mentioned in the detention order itself that the District Magistrate was conscious of the fact that the petitioner was then in judicial custody and on the other hand, while issuing a direction to the Senior Superintendent of Police, Sangrur, with regard to execution of the order. it is mentioned in the detention order that he shall lodge Shri Ranjit Singh son of Zora Singh in the Patiala Jail. A person who is already an inmate of district jail Patiala, cannot possibly be lodged therein after making of the detention order. In fact his lodging in jail preceded the detention order. Allegation of the petitioner made in this respect could not specifically be met with by any of the two respondents. From all this it appears that the detention order was prepared in a set porforma and was signed by the District Magistrate concerned in a mechanical manner without application of mind. This conclusion of mire is further reinforced by the reply on behalf of respondent No. 2, i.e. District Magistrate, Sangrur who has stated at page 3 in sub-para (v), the mere fact that this order is in the cyclostyled proforma hardly matters especially when this detention order contains the full particulars. This reply of his is indicative of the fact that merely a cyclostyled proforma as already prepared was filled in for the sake of passing of the detention order. Thus the detention order is also bad for want of application of mind by the detaining authority.