MUDASIR AHMAD MIR vs UNION TERRITORY OF J AND K AND ANR. (HOME)

HIGH COURT OF JAMMU & KASHMIR AND LADAKH
AT SRINAGAR


Pronounced on : 29.06.2026

HCP No.395/2024


Mudasir Ahmad Mir

…..Petitioner

Through: Mr. S. T. Hussain, Advocate with
Ms. Nida Nazir, Advocate

Vs

UT of J&K and others


.…. Respondents
Through: Mr. Ilyas Nazir Laway, GA vice
Mr. Mohsin S. Qadri, Sr. AAG.

CORAM:
HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE RAHUL BHARTI, JUDGE
JUDGMENT




01. Heard learned counsel for both sides.

02. Perused the writ record and the documents
therewith.

03.
The petitioner –Mudasir Ahmad Mir, acting through
his wife-Kulsuma, is petitioning this Court for the sake
restoration of his personal liberty curtailed by virtue of a
detention order under the Jammu & Kashmir Public Safety
Act, 1978 inflicted upon him thereby rendering him in the
confinement and custody of the Central Jail Kot Bhalwal,
Jammu.
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04. It is the Sr. Superintendent of Police (SSP), Srinagar
who had come forward with a dossier accompanying his letter
No. LGL/Det-PSA/2024/29728-31 11.11.2024
dated put
forth before the respondent No. 2 – District Magistrate,
Srinagar in terms whereof exercise of jurisdiction under the
Jammu & Kashmir Public Safety Act, 1978 was solicited to
subject the petitioner to preventive detention custody in order
to prevent him from acting in a manner prejudicial to
security of the State.

05.
Acting upon said dossier, the respondent No. 2 –
District Magistrate, Srinagar came forward with issuance of
Order No. DMS/PSA/50 of 2024
detention dated
03.12.2024 directing the preventive detention of the
petitioner by reference to maintenance of security of the State
and ordering his confinement in the Central Jail Kot Bhalwal,
Jammu.

06. Order No. DMS/PSA/50 of 2024
Detention dated
03.12.2024
passed by the respondent No. 2 – District
Magistrate, Srinagar rested upon the grounds of detention
formulated by the respondent No.2 – District Magistrate,
Srinagar wherein the petitioner’s alleged state of conduct and
activities came to be referred to project the petitioner as a
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person influenced by radical ideology from early age getting
into contact with active terrorists and OGW’s of TRF,
motivating the petitioner to work for the outfits as an OGW
for providing logistic support.

07.
The petitioner’s criminal antecedent in this regard
FIR No. 127/2022
are referred to by his implication in case
registered by the Police Station, Parimpora but getting bailed
02.08.2024
out on bail on .

08. By reference to the Assembly Elections of 2024, the
petitioner was alleged to have formed a gang to disrupt the
smooth conduct of elections but came to be bound down by
an order under section 170/176 of the Bharatiya Nagarik
Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (in short “BNSS, 2023”) on
12.08.2024 09.09.2024.
and

09. Reckoning that normal law of land is not able to
check the petitioner in his alleged indulgences, a case for
subjecting the petitioner to preventive detention was
conceived and taken to logical effect on the basis of grounds
of detention so formulated by the respondent No. 2 – District
Magistrate, Srinagar.
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10. The petitioner in his writ petition is assailing
preventive detention on the grounds as set out in para 3(a) to
(t).

11.
In the grounds of challenge, the petitioner is urging
that without any iota of factual ground at the disposal of the
District Police, Srinagar, the dossier was prepared in a
mechanical manner on the premise of condemning the
petitioner by his past, and not by any of his present state of
activity, to which the respondent No. 2 – District Magistrate,
Srinagar simply lend his stamp of authority acting as a post-
office to the District Police, Srinagar rather than custodian of
fundamental right to personal liberty of the petitioner.

12. The preventive detention order came to be
approved, confirmed and extended from time to time but
when this Court came to examine the detention record
produced for the perusal sake, this Court has not come
across with last extension order related to preventive
detention custody of the petitioner on the file.

13. This Court is under no iota of doubt that in the
matter of production of detention record, the concerned
authorities are under a solemn and bounden obligation to
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place complete and entire detention record before the Court
with utmost responsibility, diligence and accuracy.

14. The Home Department of the Government of the
Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir appears to be
reckoning and reeling under an impression as if the
summoning of detention record by the High Court in a
habeas corpus writ petition is a mere formality to be
complied with by handing over a photostat copy of the record
through a Clerk to the Government Advocate for onward
transmission to the Court, without the Commissioner/
Secretary, Home Department, Government of the Union
Territory of Jammu & Kashmir first verifying the record file to
ensure that the detention record in its entirety is made
available for the perusal of the constitutional court which in
turn is under a constitutional obligation to safeguard the
personal liberty of citizens, be it an undertrial, a detenue, or
a free citizen.

15. In view of the aforesaid act of omission or
commission on the part of the respondents in the matter of
maintaining proper documentation relatable to the preventive
detention of the petitioner, this Court is of firm view that
further preventive detention custody of the petitioner cannot
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be legitimized when even a constitutional court is not being
apprised of the order on the basis whereof the detention
period came to be extended last for the petitioner to suffer
preventive detention custody.

16. In view of the aforesaid, this Court hereby quashes
the preventive detention custody of the petitioner and directs
his immediate release from the concerned Jail to which effect
the Superintendent concerned to act in abidance.
17.
Disposed of.

18. Detention record produced be returned back to the
counsel representing the respondents.

(RAHUL BHARTI)
JUDGE
SRINAGAR
29.06.2026
Opinder

Whether the judgment is speaking : Yes / No

Whether the judgment is reportable : Yes / No
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