Supreme Court judgment on supplying grounds of arrest in writing not applicable to UAPA: Delhi High Court

The Delhi High Court held on Friday that the Supreme Court’s recent judgment in Pankaj Bansal v. Union of India & Ors is not squarely applicable to arrests made under the Unlawful Activites (Prevention) Act (UAPA)..In the Pankaj Bansal case, the Supreme Court held that in cases under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), grounds for arrest ought to be conveyed to in writing to the accused..Justice Tushar Rao Gedela made the observation while rejecting petitions filed by NewsClick founder Prabir Purkayastha and the website’s human resources (HR) head Amit Chakraborty challenging their remand in the UAPA case registered against them. .It was their case that they were not provided with grounds of arrest in writing. Counsel appearing for Purkayastha and Chakraborty contended that Sections 19(1) & (2) of the PMLA and Sections 43A and 43B of the UAPA can be construed together.Therefore, the fact that the Delhi Police did not provide grounds of arrest in writing to the petitioners falls foul of the Supreme Court's judgment, it was argued..After considering the case, Justice Gedela observed that Sections 19(1) & (2) of the PMLA and Sections 43A and 43B of the UAPA are not pari materia.He stressed that the noble aim of the UAPA is national security of this country and sensitivity of the information/intelligence gathered by the investigating authorities under the UAPA is of a greater significance than that under the PMLA.The Court was of the view that the factual situation and the legal proposition presented before the Supreme Court in Pankaj Bansal was entirely distinct from that in the present case."Thus, the ratio laid down by the Supreme Court in Pankaj Bansal (supra) while relying upon V. Senthil Balaji (supra) which was purely in relation to the provisions of PMLA cannot, by any stretch of imagination, be made applicable, mutatis mutandis, to the cases arising under UAPA," the Court held..However, the Bench advised the Delhi Police to henceforth provide grounds of arrest in writing, after redacting “sensitive material” to obviate challenges to the arrest as made by Purkayastha and Chakraborty."Keeping in view the law laid down by the Supreme Court in Pankaj Bansal (supra), and also considering the stringent provisions of UAPA, it would be advisable that the respondent, henceforth, provide grounds of arrest in writing, though after redacting what in the opinion of the respondent would constitute “sensitive material”. This too would obviate, as held by the Supreme Court, any such challenge to the arrest as made in the present case.”.Senior Advocates Kapil Sibal, Dayan Krishnan and Siddharth Aggarwal along with Advocates Arshdeep Singh Khurana, Harsh Srivastava, Harshit Mahalwal, Sidak Singh Anand, Manan Khanna, Nikhil Pawar, Rupali Samuel, Sowjhanya Shankar, Shreedhar Kale, Chaitanya and Vibhu Walia appeared for Purkayastha.Advocates Rohit Sharma, Rounak Nayak, Nikhil Purohit and Jatin Lalwani represented Amit Chakraborty.Delhi Police was represented through Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, Additional Standing Counsel Amol Sinha as well as Advocates Akhand Pratap Singh, Kshitiz Garg, Ashvini Kumar, Rahul Kochar, Chavi Lazarus, Zoheb Hossain, Vivek Gurnani, Baibhav and Manisha Dubey..[Read Judgement]