Case: P. L. Lakhanpal Vs. Union Of India

1. The petitioner, Puran Lal Lakhanpal was arrested and detained under Cl. (b) of sub-r. (1) of R. 30 of the Defence of India Rules 1962 by an order passed on December 10 1965 and directed to be detained in Central Jail Tehar, New Delhi. The order stated that :"Whereas the Central Government is satisfied that with a view to preventing Shri P. L. Lakhanpal, son of late Shri Diwan Chand Sharma, ................from acting in a manner prejudicial to the Defence of India and Civil Defence, public safety and the maintenance of public order, it is necessary that he should be detained;Now, therefore, ..................... the Central Government hereby directs that the said Shri. P. L. Lakhanpal be detained."He has moved this Court under Art. 32 of the Constitution by a petition presented on December 24, 1965 for a writ of Habeas Corpus directing his release. He challenges the legality of the detention order on various grounds which we now proceed to consider.

Reasoning: The Article requires only a declaration of emergency threatening the security of India by one of the causes mentioned. The words to that effect" can have no other meaning. The power to make the declaration can no doubt be exercised only when the President is satisfied about the emergency, but we do not see that the Article requires the condition precedent for the exercise of the power, that is, the Presidents satisfaction, to be stated in the declaration. The declaration shows that the President must have satisfied himself about the existence of the emergency for in these matters the rule that official acts are presumed to have been properly performed applies and there is nothing proved by the petitioner to displace that presumption. We were referred to certain other provisions, viz., Art. 311 (2) (c) of the Constitution and R. 30 (1) (b) of the Rules and it was contended that these provisions require the satisfaction to be stated. It is unnecessary to decide whether they so require. Even if they did, the requirement of the statement of the Presidents satisfaction in the present case has to be decided on the terms of Art. 352 alone. We have said that this Article does not contain any such requirement. It is of interest to point out here that the petitioner stated in his petition that he extended his full support to the Government on the Proclamation of Emergency. Obviously he could not have done so if he had any doubt about the legality of the Proclamation. Then it was said that the Proclamation should have stated the direction from which the external aggression which it mentioned was apprehended. We find nothing in the Article to require the Proclamation to state this. The Proclamation was issued on October 26, 1962 when, it is well known. Indias integrity was threatened by ChinaThe Presidents address has not been produced, and we do not know what it contained. However that may be, Art. 352 itself by Cl. (2) provides that a Proclamation issued under Cl. (1) may be revoked by a subsequent Proclamation and shall cease to operate at the expiration of two months unless before the expiration of that period it has been approved by resolutions of both Houses of Parliament. This clause also states that the Proclamation shall be laid before each House of Parliament. It has not been stated that the Houses of Parliament did not approve of the Proclamation within the period of two months. It would appear, therefore, that the only way a Proclamation ceases to have effect is by one of the events mentioned in this clause. None of them has happened. Nothing contained in an address by the President to the Houses of Parliament can operate to terminate the Proclamation. In this connection it was also said that external aggression means armed aggression and as for some time past there was no armed aggression against the territory of India, the continuance of the Proclamation was unjustified. This contention must also fail on the ground which we have just mentionedThe two first mentioned provisions do not, in our opinion, give a right to make a representation. Their effect is to provide a review of the detention order by the authorities and in the manner mentioned. The last one states that a detenu will be allowed to interview a legal practitioner for the purpose of drafting his representation against his detention. It has not been stated in the petition that the petitioner was prevented from making any representation or denied the opportunity to consult a legal practitioner. All that is said is that he had not been furnished particulars of his writings and materials on which the satisfaction of the Central Government mentioned in the order was based and that had prevented him from making a representation to the Government against his detention. This contention seems to us unwarranted. There is nothing to show that the detention order had been based on petitioners writings, nor has our attention been drawn to any provision which requires the detaining authority to supply the materials on which they had formed their satisfaction about the necessity of the detentionThis contention seems to us to be entirely groundless. The provisions referred to no doubt deal with newspapers and the manner of controlling them but they in no way lead to the conclusion that a newspaper editor may not, if the occasion arises, be detained under R. 30 (1) (b). The fact that newspapers and men connected with them may be dealt with in a certain manner does not prevent detention of such persons under R. 30 (1) (b). It was also said that R. 90 (1) (b) requires that the part of India which is to be prejudicially affected by the acts of the detenu has to be mentioned in the order. This is an idle contention. The rule no doubt says that the detention may be ordered to prevent a person from acting in a manner prejudicial to the maintenance of peaceful conditions in any part of India, but it also says that the detention can be ordered for preventing a person from acting in a manner prejudicial to the defence of India, civil defence and public safety and maintenance of public order with regard to which there is no requirement provided that they should be confined to any part of India or that that part should be mentioned in the order of detention. The order in this case was made on these grounds. The petition furnishes no material for saying that the terms of S. 44 have been violated. There is nothing to show that the detention interfered with the petitioners avocation in life in a manner not justified by that sectionThere is a bald allegation in the petition that the detaining authority had not applied its mind to the matter before making the order of detention. This part of the petition was verified as true to the petitioners knowledge. This verification was plainly false and. therefore the allegation in the petition required no answer, However, that may be a Deputy secretary to the Home Ministry of the Government of India has sworn an affidavit stating as true to his knowledge that the materials in connection with the activities of the petitioner were placed before the Union Home Minister and, on a consideration of those materials the Minister was satisfied that the detention order was necessary.