### Preventive detention cannot be based on a single criminal case when ordinary law provides sufficient remedies.

The Petitioner’s wife challenged a preventive detention order dated 06/02/2026 passed by the Director General of Police, C.I.D. Crime and Railways.

The detention was based on a single FIR registered on 22/08/2025 involving Sections 8(C), 22(B), and 29 of the NDPS Act, 1985.

Despite the Petitioner being granted bail by a competent court in the substantive criminal case, the detaining authority concluded that his activities were prejudicial to "public order" under the provisions of the PITNDPS Act, 1988.

The Petitioner was subsequently detained in Special Jail, Porbandar.

Whether the subjective satisfaction of the detaining authority was legally sustainable when the detention order was based on a single criminal case where bail had already been granted.

Whether the activities of the detenue reached the threshold of disturbing "public order" as defined under the Act of 1988.

The court applied Section 3(1) of the Prevention of Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1988, which empowers authorities to preventively detain individuals to prevent illicit traffic.

It relied on the definition of "illicit traffic" under Section 2(e) of the same Act.

Crucially, the court applied the principle from *Dhanya M. v. State of Kerala* (AIR 2025 SC 2868), which establishes that preventive detention is an extraordinary power to be used sparingly as an exception to Article 21 of the Constitution.

Following *Rekha v. State of Tamil Nadu* and *Ameena Begum v. State of Telengana*, the court emphasized that when ordinary criminal law (such as cancellation of bail) provides sufficient remedy, the extraordinary measure of preventive detention should not be resorted to.

The Court observed that the detaining authority placed reliance on only one registered case to conclude that the Petitioner's activities disturbed public order.

The Court reasoned that the mere registration of an FIR is insufficient to establish a threat to "public order" or "public tranquility" unless specific material demonstrates such a disturbance.

The Bench noted that the Petitioner had already been granted bail by a competent court, yet the State failed to move for the cancellation of that bail—a less restrictive and more appropriate legal remedy.

Applying the "strict construction" rule for "hard laws" like preventive detention, the Court found that the detaining authority failed to show how the Petitioner's actions fell squarely within the legal requirements for detention, rendering the subjective satisfaction mechanical and without application of mind.

The High Court allowed the petition and quashed the detention order dated 06/02/2026.

The Court directed that the detenue be set at liberty forthwith, provided he is not required in any other case, and made the Rule absolute.