Karnataka HC sets aside externment order, holding Deputy Commissioner of Police lacked authority under Police Act

The Deputy Commissioner of Police, Kalaburagi, issued a show-cause notice to the petitioner on 13 November 2025 and passed an externment order against him on 25 November 2025.

The petitioner challenged the notice and order under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution, contending that the Deputy Commissioner of Police was not an authority empowered to order externment under Section 55 of the Karnataka Police Act, 1963.

He also sought a declaration that the proceedings were vitiated by non-consideration of his oral submissions.

The State supported the order, relying on the petitioner’s alleged habitual offending and the authority’s assessment under Sections 55 and 56 of the Act.

1. Whether the Deputy Commissioner of Police was competent under Section 55 of the Karnataka Police Act, 1963, to pass the petitioner’s externment order.

2. Whether the externment order should be set aside on the ground that it was passed by an authority lacking jurisdiction.

Section 55 of the Karnataka Police Act, 1963, identifies the authorities empowered to exercise the externment power: the Commissioner in a city or other area for which a Commissioner has been appointed under Section 7, and, in other areas, the District Magistrate or Sub-Divisional Magistrate having jurisdiction and specially empowered by the Government.

The court relied on Chandrakant Shankar Vaddar v. State of Karnataka and Others, W.P. No. 104096 of 2026, decided 24 August 2026, for the rule that the statutory authorities specified in Section 55 cannot be replaced by another authority through executive delegation; a Superintendent of Police is not within the categories named in the section.

The court also noted that it had perused Sections 7–11, Section 2(10), Sections 55 and 56 of the Act, and Sections 14–17 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023.

The court treated the identity of the decision-maker as determinative.

It was undisputed that the Deputy Commissioner of Police had passed the externment order.

Applying Section 55 and the reasoning in Chandrakant Shankar Vaddar, the court held that the Deputy Commissioner of Police was not among the authorities statutorily empowered to make the order.

The order therefore lacked jurisdiction, irrespective of the State’s submissions concerning the petitioner’s alleged habitual offending.

It allowed the writ petition and set aside the externment order dated 25 November 2025; it made no order as to costs.