Kalaburagi Man’s Yearlong Externment Quashed As Karnataka HC Finds DCP Was Not Competent To Order It

The petitioner challenged an externment order made by Respondent No. 2, the Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) and Special Executive Magistrate, Kalaburagi, under Sections 55(a) and (b) of the Karnataka Police Act, 1963.

The order directed his externment for one year.

He argued that Respondent No. 2 lacked statutory authority to make the order, relying on a coordinate-bench decision concerning the authorities empowered under Section 55.

The State supported the order, describing the petitioner as a habitual offender.

The Court recorded that the impugned order was dated 5 September 2026.

Section 55 of the Karnataka Police Act, 1963, identifies the authorities competent to exercise its externment powers: the Commissioner in the areas specified by the Act and, in other areas, the District Magistrate or Sub-Divisional Magistrate having jurisdiction and specially empowered by the Government.

The provision does not permit substitution of an authority outside those statutory categories by executive delegation.

The Court relied on the coordinate-bench decision in Chandrakant Shankar Vaddar v. State of Karnataka & Others, W.P. No. 104096/2026, dated 24 August 2026, which held that a Superintendent of Police could not be designated to exercise Section 55 powers because that office is not among the authorities named in the provision.

The Court also considered Sections 7–11, Section 2(10), Sections 55 and 56 of the Act, and Sections 14–17 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023.

Applying the statutory scheme and the coordinate-bench reasoning, the Court held that the authority to make an externment order under Section 55 is confined to the officers identified by the legislature.

Respondent No. 2 was the Deputy Commissioner of Police, not an authority within the statutory categories.

The State’s submission that the petitioner was a habitual offender did not cure the absence of jurisdiction.

It allowed the writ petition and set aside the impugned order dated 5 September 2026; no order was made as to costs.