The Supreme Court has reieterated the precedent set by it in regard to the detention orders issued under NSA in one its ruling.

In view of that the division bench comprising of Justice DY Chandrachud and Justice Dinesh Maheshwari observed that failure of the government to communicate the rejection of the representation in a time bound manner would vitiate the order of detention.

The Court in the present matter has allowed an appeal filed against a HC judgment via which, it had upheld an order of detention passed against apellant under Section 3 of the National Security Act 1980.

The appellant was an employee in the pharmaceutical wing of City Hospital which was run by one Sarabjit Singh Mokha who was an appellant in companion petition (Sarabjeet Singh Mokha vs District Magistrate). 

Mokha was arrested in an FIR against him alleging that he procured fake Remdesivir injections which were administered to patients during the Covid-19 pandemic in order to make illegal profits thereby endangering the life of the general public. Later, he was detained under Section 3(2) of the NSA, for a period of three months. He then submitted a representation against the said order both to the Home Department of the State Government and the Ministry of Home Affairs of the Central Government. The State Govt, in terms of the provisions of Section 10 of the NSA, submitted the grounds for detention and the representation of the appellant to the Advisory Board. The Board further submitted its report to the State Government under Section 11 opining that there was sufficient cause for the detention. Aggrieved, Mokha challenged the detention order before the High Court which dismissed his writ petition in disagreement of which he approached the Supreme Court via a Special Leave Petition was under Article 136 of the Constitution. The SC allowed the same and set aside the impugned judgement of High Court.

The Court noted that the facts of the two cases are substantially similar and remarked that in Sarabjeet Singh Mokha case, the two principal grounds which weighed with the Court for quashing the detention order were

(i) the detenue was deprived of the right which emanates from the provisions of Section 8(1) of having the representation being considered expeditiously; and

(ii) the failure of the Central and the State governments to communicate the rejection of the representation in a time bound manner would vitiate the order of detention.

The Court stressed that no distinguishable feature has been indicated in the counter affidavit which has been filed in these proceedings.

"As a matter of fact, as already indicated above, the appellant was in the pharmaceutical wing of the hospital which was conducted by the appellant in the previous case decided by this Court. Both the AAG and ASG did not dispute the applicability of the earlier judgment of this Court.", it added.'

In view of the above, the detention order in the present matter has also been set aside.

Read Order Here:

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