Supreme Court orders release of NewsClick founder Prabir Purkayastha, declares his arrest ‘invalid’

Satya Prakash

New Delhi, May 15

The Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered the release of NewsClick founder Prabir Purkayastha as it declared as illegal his arrest by the Delhi police and his subsequent remand in a case under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967.

Noting that a copy of the remand application was not provided to Purkayastha or his counsel before passing the October 4, 2023 remand order, a Bench of Justice BR Gavai and Justice Sandeep Mehta held that his arrest and the subsequent remand orders were vitiated.

The top court ordered Purkayasatha’s release subject to him furnishing the bail bonds to the satisfaction of the trial court.

Purkayastha has been in custody under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, since October 3 2023 following his arrest by the Special Cell of the Delhi police.

According to the FIR, huge funds came to the news portal allegedly from China to “disrupt the sovereignty of India” and cause disaffection against the country. Purkayastha allegedly conspired with a group — People’s Alliance for Democracy and Secularism (PADS) — to sabotage the electoral process during the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

The Bench relied on the ruling in Pankaj Bansal’s case in which the top court had indicted the Enforcement Directorate for arbitrary exercise of powers conferred on it under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002.

“Copy of the remand application was not provided to the appellant. This vitiates the arrest of the appellant following the Pankaj Bansal case. Though we would have released him without surety, but since a chargesheet has been filed, we release him with surety and bail bond,” Justice Mehta said, pronouncing the verdict.

While granting bail to Gurugram-based realty group M3M’s directors Basant Bansal and Pankaj Bansal in a money-laundering case, a Bench of Justice AS Bopanna and Justice Sanjay Kumar had on October 3, 2023 ruled that it’s necessary for the probe agency to furnish a copy of grounds of arrest to the arrested person “as a matter of course and without exception”.

Citing Article 22(1) of the Constitution which provides that no person who is arrested shall be detained in custody without being informed, as soon as may be, of the grounds for such arrest, it had noted, “This being the fundamental right guaranteed to the arrested person, the mode of conveying information of the grounds of arrest must necessarily be meaningful so as to serve the intended purpose.”

The top court had said that the probe agency must act in a transparent and non-vindictive manner, conforming to pristine standards of fair play in its actions.