Can't pass blanket orders: Bombay High Court on mass detentions during anti-CEC stir in Mumbai

No blanket orders can be passed, the Bombay High Court remarked during the hearing of a public interest litigation (PIL) challenging widespread preventive detentions and alleged police excesses during demonstrations in Mumbai on October 10 and 11, 2026 over alleged irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. [Sagar Devre v. State of Maharashtra & Ors]

These detentions allegedly took place during demonstrations demanding accountability from Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over alleged irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls. 

A Bench of Chief Justice Mahesh Chandra Tripathi and Justice Advait Sethna deferred the hearing to Monday after government pleader Manish Upadhye sought time to seek instructions.

In the meantime, Advocate Manish Tomar for the PIL petitioner sought interim relief. He prayed for directions to the police asking them to release people who are detained.

The Bench, however, indicated they could not pass such orders.

"We cannot pass such blanket orders. Whatever are the instances you bring those on record, we will take care of it,” the bench said.

The petition filed by advocate and social activist Sagar Kantilal Devre challenges the alleged indiscriminate roundups at August Kranti Maidan and Shivaji Park. He has claimed that this affected demonstrators, bystanders and women.

“This PIL is filed to protect one simple freedom of every resident of Mumbai, the freedom to walk on the roads of this city, to stand peacefully with others, and to stay in one's own home, without being lifted and carried away by the police for no individual reason,” the PIL says. 

The plea also condemns the targeting of students picked up from their homes based on the July 2026 protest cases already quashed by the Supreme Court. The PIL clarifies that it does not dispute the police's legal power to regulate public assemblies or the political stance.

“The petitioner challenges one thing only: the practice of detaining citizens of Mumbai without any individual, lawful and recorded reason, and the use of a quashed FIR or a past detention as a permanent mark against a citizen,” the PIL reads.

The petition has alleged over-reach. 

“Because Article 14 prohibits arbitrary state action: a person cannot be subjected to coercive action solely on the basis of association, past detention, appearance in a list or presence in a public place, without a lawful and individualised basis,” the plea states. 

It further stresses that taking coercive action on erased records amounts to hostile discrimination, asserting that a quashed FIR is no FIR at all.

The petition prays for a direction to declare the indiscriminate detention of peaceful demonstrators, pedestrians and individuals picked up without lawful individual justification unconstitutional. 

It also calls for an independent inquiry into police excesses, preservation of all electronic records and formulation of standard operating procedures for protest policing.