Akriti Chaudhary case: Allahabad HC slams Noida DM; says bureaucrats must be loyal to Constitution, not executive

The Allahabad High Court has reminded Indian Administrative Service (IAS) and Indian Police Service (IPS) officers that their loyalty is towards the Constitution and not the political executive.

A Division Bench of Justice Atul Sreedharan and Justice Achal Sachdev added that every time bureaucrats and those in the police ignore their oath and allegiance to India and its Constitution, people would view them as an oppressive vestige of the British Empire.

Such a situation will arouse angst and hatred towards them and end up creating an environment of civil unrest in the State, the Bench added.

It warned that if the Court fails to act against excesses of bureaucrats, the State may be reduced to an Orwellian Dystopia.

"This Court, while correcting their excesses and/or illegalities, especially those that impinge upon the civil liberties of the citizens without adequate cause or due process (inhering in the procedure established by law), may pass harsh orders to compensate the citizen so wronged, besides recording their despotic conduct. Else, it shan't be long before the errant in the bureaucracy reduce the State of Uttar Pradesh to an Orwellian Dystopia," the Bench said.

The Court further said that the officers are endowed with immense powers by law as they bear the responsibility of upholding the constitutional and legal rights, dignity, honour and welfare of the citizens by just and good governance.

However, it added that they must also have a realisation that with great powers come great responsibility and an expected introspection on the part of the bureaucracy as to whether such powers be resorted to, and to what extent.

"Else, in the words coined by Rudyard Kipling (spoken publicly by Stanley Baldwin) that "power without responsibility – the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages", will ring true whenever the power is exercised by the bureaucracy in a cavalier manner, devoid of human sensitivity resulting in deleterious consequences for the citizen," the Bench said.

The Court made these observations in its judgment quashing the preventive detention of Akriti Chaudhary, a History graduate from Delhi University, who was detained under the National Security Act (NSA) in connection with the protest of industrial workers in April in Noida

The Court found that there was no material to warrant her detention under NSA. It also observed that she had only urged citizens to support the labourers and not called for violence.

In this backdrop, the Court emphasised that freedom of speech and expression extends to coming out on the streets and agitating a cause, and gathering peacefully without arms or without threat to the public order.

However, it flagged that a peaceful agitation can be scuttled by mischievous elements interested in ensuring that such an agitation is broken and acts of violence get attributed to the entire group.

It added that the State must train the police force in ensuring public order in such large gatherings and also resort to videography of the gathering so that accountability may be affixed, in the event of an outbreak of violence.

The Court also reminded the State that preventing people from gathering in public spaces or agitating their rights on the grounds of assumed breach of peace, would be throwing the baby out of the bathwater.

"If such a view is taken by the State and approved of by the Courts, it would lead to a cessation of the collective expression of opinion in public spaces. The Constitution protects such a right and the same cannot be trifled with merely on the subjective opinion of the State," the Court said.

The Court said that the State must realize that every society has its own tensions and its share of disagreements with the government.

Allowing agitations is like the safety valve in a pressure cooker, which ensures that the building up of pressure is released, the Bench emphasised.

It advised against preventing agitations and bottling up public feelings to such an extent that when people spill out onto the streets, violence becomes inevitable.

In Chaudhary's case, the Court said that Gautam Buddha Nagar Deputy Magistrate Medha Roopam's conduct was worthy of derision.

The Court said that when the police report against Chaudhary lacked any credible material, the officer was expected to be vigilant and examine the record threadbare before resorting to the "oppressive provisions" of NSA.

"The District Magistrate Gautam Buddha Nagar is guilty of violating her oath of allegiance, making this a fit case for the imposition of compensation to the petitioner," the Bench said.

It proceeded to direct payment of ₹5 lakh compensation to Chaudhary. The amount has been ordered to be recovered from the District Magistrate's salary and all such officers responsible for preparing the report leading to Chaudhary's detention under NSA.

"The displeasure of this Court against the conduct of the District Magistrate concerned and all such other officers of the police who were involved in preparing the dossier against the petition, be noted in their service records," the Court ordered further.

Senior Advocate Colin Gonsalves with advocates Charlie Prakash, Manik Gupta and Rajvendra Singh represented the detenue.

Advocate Balram Govind Tripathi with advocate Kuldeep Kumar represented the Union of India.

Additional Government Advocate Nitesh Kumar Srivastava represented the State government.

[Read Judgment]