S G SARDESAI Vs. PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This is an application under Section 491, Criminal P.C., by one S.G. Sardesai with the prayer that his detention being illegal, he may be set at liberty. The applicant is a member of the Communist Party of India. He is a Maharashtrian and his permanent residence is in Bombay. On 15 July 1948, he was arrested in Azamgarh without any warrant and without any intimation to him as to under what law he was being arrested. After 12 days custody, an order was passed by the Provincial Government on 27 July 1948, under Clause (a) of Sub-section (1) of Section 3, United Provinces Maintenance of Public Order (Temporary) Act, 1947, directing his detention for six months. The same day a notice under Section 5 of the Act communicating to him the grounds of detention was drawn up and was handed over to the applicant on 31 July 1948. The grounds mentioned in that notice are: You have been inciting kisans against Government and the zamindars. You have also been preaching hatred and violence against the Government as by law established. In several speeches at different places in this province you advised the kisans to take possession of land by force. On 15 July 1948, you were arrested in the Azamgarh district under suspicious circumstances along with Jai Bahadur Singh, an absconder, from whose possession an unlicensed D. B. B. L. gun wag recovered at the time.

(2.) On 14 September 1948, the habeas corpus application was made to this Court. An affidavit was sworn in by one S.K. Das in support of the application. It was admitted in that affidavit that the applicant is an active member of the Communist Party of India and his area of activity comprehends the whole of the Indian Dominion, and that he has to work in all the provinces and States. It was contended that the grounds of detention communicated to the applicant were vague and indefinite inasmuch as they did not give the dates, the places and the substance of speeches alleged to have been delivered by the applicant. It was asserted that Government was detaining the Communists so that all criticisms of the bureaucracy and the Government might be silenced. It was denied that Jai Bahadur Singh was an absconder. The recovery of the gun from his possession was also denied. The validity of the notice issued under Section 5 was questioned also on a legal ground inasmuch as it was not issued in the name of the Governor. A supplementary affidavit was filed on behalf of the applicant on 28 September 1928. It was mentioned in it that the applicant did not deliver any speeches in this Province since the beginning of 1947. It was mentioned that the applicant had asked the Home Secretary twice to furnish him with copies of his alleged objectionable speeches, but the Home Secretary did not send any reply.

(3.) A counter-affidavit has been filed on behalf of the Government. It is sworn in by Shiv Bahadur Rai, Sub-Inspector, Police Lines, Azamgarh. It appears from the counter-affidavit that when the first grounds of detention were communicated to the applicant he addressed a letter to the Home Secretary bringing to his notice the vagueness of those grounds. In reply to that letter the Home Secretary sent the applicant a detailed letter on 20 September 1948, in which greater particulars of the grounds mentioned in the notice dated 27 July 1948, were given and some additional grounds were also mentioned. The dates and the places of the meetings alleged to have been addressed by the applicant were mentioned in this letter of 20 September 1948. In the counter-affidavit it was admitted that Jai Bahadur Singh was not an absconder in the true sense of the word. It was explained that he was described as an absconder because he was not traceable in spite of attempts to trace him or to get hold of him. The allegation in the supplementary affidavit that the applicant had not delivered any speeches in Province was denied.