Gautam Navlakha arrest: State of Maharashtra moves SC in appeal against Delhi HC order

The State of Maharashtra has approached the Supreme Court in appeal against the Delhi High Court order, which set aside the transit remand order against activist Gautam Navlakha.

. The State has questioned the maintainability of the habeas corpus petition filed by Navlakha before the High Court, in light of two Supreme Court decisions on the topic.

. Further, it has been contended that the High Court, while setting aside the transit remand order, did not apply Section 167(1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) correctly. Particularly, it is contended that the High Court had erred in holding that production of the case diary was necessary while applying for transit remand. As per the SLP filed by the State,

. “Section 167 (1) of the code of criminal procedure makes it clear that in case an accused is to be produced before the jurisdictional magistrate, then it is incumbent upon the police to produce the case diary. In case the police applies for transit remand before a Magistrate having no jurisdiction, then it is not necessary for the police to produce the case diary. In the case in hand, the Police arrested 5 persons from different places in the country. It was, therefore, not expected and not possible to produce the case diary before the concerned Courts.”

. The SLP goes on to state that the writ petition ought not have been entertained by the High Court, in view of the Supreme Court’s decisions in State of Maharashtra v. Tanseem Rizwan Siddique and Saurabh Kumar v. Jailor, Koneil Jail .

. The fact that the High Court observed that the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate passed the transit remand order without application of mind is also assailed by the State of Maharashtra.

. “It needs to be seen that, while passing the order of transit remand the Magistrate had gone through the application filed by the Police and he had heard the concerned Police officer. It is not possible/ pragmatic to mention minute details while passing the order of remand. The Ld. Chief Metropolitan Magistrate has also mentioned about his thoughtful consideration to the submissions of the concerned police officer.”

. The State has also defended the procedure of arrest followed by the Maharashtra Police, stating that the High Court had “unnecessarily gone into that aspect”.

. In its view, it was not necessary for the High Court to put an end to the house arrest of Navlakha, after the Supreme Court had extended the same for four weeks.

. Therefore, it is contended that since the Police has a “good case on merits”, the High Court order should be set aside, lest the State suffer “irreparable loss”.

. It is also prayed that Navlakha be kept under house arrest keeping in line with the Supreme Court order passed last week.

. Following his arrest in the early hours of August 28, Gautam Navlakha had approached the Delhi High Court challenging the transit remand order granted to the Maharashtra Police. Observing that it was not possible to make out a case from the documents placed before it, the Bench of Justices S Muralidhar and Vinod Goel posted the case for the next day, directing that Navlakha be placed under house arrest.

. The next day, a petition was filed in the Supreme Court on behalf of Navlakha and four other arrestees – Sudha Bharadwaj , Vernon Gonsalves, Varavara Rao and Arun Ferreira. The petition called for a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe the arrests of the above mentioned. The Court issued notice in the matter and posted it for September 6. After hearing the parties, the Court reserved its order.

. Then, on September 28, the majority of the Supreme Court Bench of then Chief Justice Dipak Misra , and Justices AM Khanwilkar and DY Chandrachud refused the prayer for constitution of an SIT , and directed that the house arrest of the activists continue for another four weeks. Justice Chandrachud had dissented from the majority, and was of the view that an SIT should have been constituted.

. The arrested and detained activists were granted liberty to take recourse to “appropriate remedy as may be permissible in law”.

. On Monday, the Delhi High Court set aside the transit remand order against Navalkha, and put an end to his house arrest.

. Read the SLP:

. Read the Delhi HC order:

Gautam Navlakha arrest: State of Maharashtra moves SC in appeal against Delhi HC order

Aditya AK

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