HC quashes PSA detention of shopkeeper
Srinagar
The Jammu and Kashmir High Court has quashed the detention of a shopkeeper from Ganderbal district, who was booked under the Public Safety Act, holding that the detainee was not supplied the material evidence relied upon by the magistrate concerned while considering the grounds of his detention, reported The Tribune.
According to report published by The Tribune, as submitted in the petition challenging the PSA detention of Mushtaq Ahmad Wani, 50, a shopkeeper hailing from Kurag, Ganderbal, was arrested on August 7, 2019. He was subsequently booked under the Public Safety Act on August 9, 2019.
As per the orders of detention, Wani was ordered to be lodged in a jail in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh, said the report.
As submitted in the petition challenging the PSA detention of Mushtaq Ahmad Wani, 50, a shopkeeper hailing from Kurag, Ganderbal, was arrested on August 7, 2019. He was subsequently booked under the Public Safety Act on August 9, 2019, reported The Tribune.
“As per the orders of detention, Wani was ordered to be lodged in a jail in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh,” it said.
“Examining the present case on the touchstone of the above settled position of law, there are specific averments made in the petition that the detenue was not supplied the materials relied upon by the detaining authority. It is stated that the detenue was provided material in the shape of grounds of detention. No other material/documents, as referred to in the order of detention and the grounds, are shown to have been supplied to the detenue,” The Tribune quoted a single bench of Justice Ali Mohammad Magrey as having said in his orders, while quashing the detention order of Wani on technical grounds.
“On these counts alone, in view of the above-settled position of law, the detention of the detenue is vitiated, the detenue having been prevented from making an effective and purposeful representation against the order of detention,” the bench held while ordering his release from preventive detention.
In the petition filed by Mushtaq Wani through his lawyer advocate BA Tak, it had been submitted as on the date of passing of the PSA detention order, Wani was already in police custody and the detenue was not provided the material evidence forming the basis of his detention order so as to enable him to make an effective representation against it.
The government counsel, in his reply while defending the PSA detention, had submitted that after abrogation of Article 370, the detenue was “reportedly motivating youth to stone pelting at security forces at various places, therefore, he was again booked under unlawful activities by the police station, Ganderbal, in a case FIR No. 51/2019 under Sections 10 and 13 of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act,” reported The Tribune.
