A Division Bench of the Kerala High Court on Monday upheld the compensation of ₹l lakh awarded by a single judge to a person who was detained illegally by the police on charges of having Maoists links.
The Bench comprising Chief Justice Hrishikesh Roy and Justice A.K. Jayasankaran Nambiar upheld the compensation while dismissing an appeal filed by the State government against the single judge’s directive to pay ₹1 lakh to Shyam Balakrishnan, who is the son of a former High Court judge.
Mr. Balakrishnan was detained by the anti-naxal squad of the Kerala Police at Vellamunda in Wayanad on May 20, 2014 on the suspicion that he had links with a Maoist outfit.
Procedure not followed
According to him, he was arrested without following any procedure. In fact, he had been living in that area for more than four years along with his partner.
The court observed that it had no hesitation in holding that in view of the primacy accorded under the Constitution to a person’s fundamental right to privacy and personal liberty, the action of the police in detaining and interrogating the petitioner and searching his residence without following the procedure mandated under the Code of Criminal Procedure was wholly unjustified.
Personal liberty
The Bench added that the freedom of an individual to embrace a particular political ideology was an aspect of his/her fundamental right to personal liberty.
A person could not be persecuted merely on a suspicion that he/she had embraced the Maoist ideology. Article 21 of the Constitution mandates that no person shall be deprived of his life or personal liberty except according to the procedure established by law. No material was produced by the State government to show what was the basis of the suspicion that Shyam Balakrishnan had links with Maoist outfits.
The State had submitted that there was no arrest at all and no search was conducted in the house of Mr. Balakrishnan. The single judge had in fact accepted the facts that the police officials had acted bona fide. Despite the finding, the single judge went on to fix liability on the State. The single judge’s verdict was against the sovereign immunity of the government.
Not exorbitant
The Bench observed that the compensation amount was not exorbitant and it was also adequate to inform the State authorities of the importance attached to personal liberty in the Constitution. It also served to emphasise caution the authorities must exercise while discharging their lawful duties when they are confronted with issues relating to the personal liberty of the citizen.
