HC quashes 5 PSAs

Excelsior Correspondent

SRINAGAR, Oct 19: The High Court today quashed five detention orders passed under J&K Public Safety Act with the directions to the authorities to release all the detenues from the preventive custody.
Justice Sanjay Dhar quashed the detention orders of three detenues – Nazir Ahmad Rather of Dadasara Tral, Fayaz Ahmad Shergojri of Midoora Tehsil Awantipora and Majid Rasheed Dar of Papchan Bandipora while as Justice Sanjeev Kumar quashed the detention orders of detenues namely Tawheed Ahmad Zargar and Bashir Ahmad Chauhan, both residents of Srinagar.
All the five detenues were detained under PSA on 30.10.2021, 18.10.2021, 16.12.2021, 25.01.2022 and 18.10.2021 by the District Magistrates of district Pulwama, Bandipora and Srinagar in order to prevent them from any subversive activity prejudicial to the security of the state.
Justice Dhar while quashing the orders of detention said there is no reference to any recent incident involving the detenue Rather in the grounds of detention as such the order of detention has been based on past and stale incidents.
In case of Shergojri and Dar, court said, they have been hampered by non-supply of these vital documents in making an effective representation before the Advisory Board, as a result whereof his case has been considered by the Advisory Board in the absence of his representation, as is clear from the detention record.
Justice Kumar while dealing with the case of detenue- Zargar viewed his plea is liable to succeed on the ground that the activities attributed to him, which have also resulted in registration of FIR No. 65/2019 and 154/2021, may constitute law and order problem but cannot, by any stretch of reasoning, be construed to be prejudicial to the maintenance of public order.
Court quashed the detention of detenue-Chauhan on the ground that the respondent-Detaining Authority, has failed to explain the delayed execution of the impugned order of detention. “For the foregoing reasons, we find merit in these petitions and the same are, accordingly, allowed. Impugned orders of detention are quashed with a direction to the respondents to release the detenues forthwith, if not required in any other case”, the court directed.