Jammu & Kashmir High Court quashes preventive detention of Advocate Mohammad Ashraf Bhat

The High Court of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh recently quashed the preventive detention of Mohammad Ashraf Bhat, a 71-year-old advocate and former General Secretary of the Kashmir High Court Bar Association [Mohammad Ashraf Bhat V/s Union Territory of J&K]..Justice Rahul Bharti found that the decision to place Bhat under preventive detention was seriously faulty and flawed. The Court observed that there were serious procedural irregularities and a concealment of material facts by the authorities.The Court proceeded to order Bhat's immediate release from a jail in Kathua, where he had been detained since July 17, 2024, under the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act, 1978 (PSA). "The preventive detention of the petitioner (Bhat) is found to be seriously faulty and flawed ... The preventive detention custody of the petitioner-detenu being based upon procedural pitfalls is, thus, held to be illegal and liable to be quashed ... The petitioner is directed to be restored, without loss of any time, to his personal liberty by his immediate release from the concerned Jail," the Court's May 5 ruling said. .Bhat was detained in July 2024 under the PSA on allegations that he was involved in promoting secessionist ideologies and in activities that were prejudicial to the security of the State..In Jammu & Kashmir, police are detaining 'secessionist' senior lawyers.He eventually moved a writ petition before the High Court, through his wife, challenging his preventive detention. Among other grounds, his counsel pointed out that the authorities had suppressed material facts while citing Bhat's earlier preventive detention in 2019 to justify the latest preventive detention order. In this regard, Bhat's counsel highlighted that the 2019 detention had been quashed on merits by the Jammu and Kashmir High Court. However, this fact had not been mentioned in the dossier prepared by the Senior Superintendent of Police, Srinagar to justify Bhat's detention in 2024. The counsel added that the latest preventive detention order was based on the same grounds mentioned in the 2019 detention order, which had been set aside by the High Court in 2020. The High Court opined that this was a serious lapse on the part of the authorities. "The first and foremost flaw is the stone like silence on the part of the Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP), Srinagar and also of District Magistrate, Srinagar in putting out in full with respect to the petitioner’s preventive detention effected in the year 2019 ... This Court is clueless to decipher as to why in his dossier, the Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP), Srinagar missed out in documenting in his dossier the details … of the petitioner’s preventive detention effected in the year 2019 and its consequent quashment …This omission is too serious to be taken casually much less by this Court as being the guardian of the fundamental rights of a citizen of India which the petitioner undoubtedly is," it said. .The Court also criticized the authorities for its failure to notify Bhat about the status of a written representation made by him against his preventive detention, as well as the failure to give him a personal hearing. "The preventive detention of the petitioner is further flawed because of the petitioner being kept uninformed about the fate of his written representation," it noted. .These grounds are sufficient to render the preventive detention of Bhat bad in the eyes of the law, the Court ruled. "The exercise of preventive detention jurisdiction is a double-edged sword which is unsparing both for the hand which wields it and the hand which bears its blow. If mishandled by the wielder of said sword, then the effect stays on the side of the wielder whereas the relief passes on to the side of the person aimed to suffer its blow, and which precisely is the situation in hand before this Court in the context of the present case," it added, while quashing the preventive detention order. .Senior Advocates RA Jan, and ZA Qurashi, and Advocates Adil Mushtaq, Rehana Fayaz, and Mohammad Younis appeared for Bhat.Government Advocate Jehangir Ahmad Dar appeared for the Jammu and Kashmir authorities. .[Read Order]