LexDWARIKA PRASAD SAHU versus THE STATE OF BIHAR & ORS.
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702 DWARIKA PRASAD SAHU A v. THE STATE OF BIHAR & ORS. November 12, 1974 (Y. V. OiANDRACHUD AND P. N. BHAGWATI, JJ.] Mai11te11ance of Internal Sernrity Act, 1971-S. 3(1)(iii)-Mixing of relemm B and irrelevant grounds in the order of detentio11-Efjecr of. The Bihar Motor Spirit and High Speed Diesel Oil Dealers' Licensing Order, 1966 requireq that the names and addresses of the purchasers must be mentioned in the cash m~mos; but by a subsequent order issued by the State Government this requirement was dispensed with. On receipt of complaints that the petitioner was indulging in certain mal-practices, including charging a price higher than the controlled price, a surprise physical verification of the stock of h,igh speed diesel C oil was made and it was found that he had· stock of oil in excess of that shown in the stock register. The petitioner was detained under s. 3(2) (iii) of the Main- tenance of Internal Security Act, 1971 on the ground, among others, that he sold 762 litres of the said oil wi!hout ·giving the names and addresses of the purchasers in· the cash receipts in contravention of cl. 7 of the licence and the supply under In a petition under Article 32 of the Constitution it was contended that the District Magistrate had totally failed to apply his mind and his subjective satis- faction based Inter alia on ground number 5 was therefore vitiated and it ren- D dered the order of detention invalid. the said cash memos was to fictitious persons. Allowing the petition, HELD: The conclusion is inescapable that since ground no. 5 was wholly mis- conceived, non-existent and not available under the law the order of detenlion must be held to be invalid. If there is one principle more firmly established than any other in this field of jurisprudence, it is that even if one of the grounds or reasons which led to the subjective satisfaction of the detaining authority is non- existent, misconceived ~ irrelevant the order of detention would be invalid and it would not .avail the detaining authority to contend that the other grounds or reasons are good and do not suffer from any such infirmity because it can ne:ver be predicated to what extent the bad grounds or reasons operated on the mind ()f the detaining authority or whether the detention order would have been made at all if the bad grounds or reasons were excluded and the good grounds or reasons alone were hefore the detaining authority. [707F; C-D] Shlbba11 T.Al Saxena v. ;T/ie State of Ull'ar Pradesh, (1954] S.C.R. 418, Dr. Ram Manohar Lohia v. State of Bihar & Ors., [1966] 1 S.C.R. 709, Pushkar Mukhariee & Ors. v. Tlze State of We.<t BenRal, [1969] 2 S.C.R. 635 and Blram Chand v. State of Uttar Pradesh, A.LR. 1974 S.C. 1161, followed. I· In the i111tant case if only the District Magistrate had applied his mind pro· perly and carefully and acted with a greater sense of responsibility, the infirmity vitiating the or11er of detention could have been easily avoided. Not mentioning G the names and addresses of the customers in the cash memos was no longer a breach of cl. 7 of the licence and it could not support an inference that the sales covered by the cash memos were to fictitious persons. The District Magistrate mechanically subscribed to the grounds of detention without even caring to exa· mine whether g:round no. 5 w:Ls correct or not and proceeded to make the order of detention. [706H] Ground l disclosed yet another instance of non-apnlication of mind on the part of the District Magistrate. This circumstance also is indicative of the rather 11 casual manner in which the District Magistrate proceeded to make the order of detention without proper application of mind and it could have an invalidating consequence on the order of detention. [707H; 708A] A B c D E G H D. P. SAHU V. BIHAJt (Bhagwati, /.) ORIGINAL JURISDICTION : Writ Petition No. 346 of 1974. Under Art. 32 of the Constitution of India. 703 G. K. Daphtary, K. K. Sinha and S. K. Sinha, for the petitioner. U. P. Singh, for the respondents. The Judgment of the Court was delivered by BHAGWATI, J.-It is with utmost reluctance, and we might almost say regretfully, that we allow this petition directed against the vali- dity of an order of detention made by the District Magistrate, Ranchi under secti()n 3(2}(iii) of the Maintenance of Internal Security Act, 1971. If only the District Magistrate had applied his mind properly and carefull
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