New Delhi: Citing procedural lapses, the Madras high court quashed a 2022 order by the Chennai police under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act (UAPA) freezing the bank account of a trust accused of aiding the banned Popular Front of India (PFI).
A two-judge bench comprising Justices M.S. Ramesh and Sunder Mohan noted on Monday (March 25) that no inquiry was conducted in the case before the police ordered the Tamil Nadu Development Foundation Trust’s account to be frozen, despite the UAPA mandating this.
As a result, the order violated the fundamental rights to equality and to protection of life and liberty, the bench said, adding that it also violated the principles of natural justice.
“On this sole ground, the impugned order cannot be legally sustainable,” the bench said.
It also noted that the Union government – which, apart from a Chennai assistant commissioner of police and a local Indian Bank official was one of the respondents in the case – did not follow the UAPA’s procedure for determining the trust’s association with the PFI.
According to the Act’s procedure, when the government comes to a “subjective satisfaction” that a person aids an unlawful association with money or credits or possesses them with the intention to aid the association, it must conduct an inquiry and then pass prohibitory orders.
But the bench said that in this case, the Union government didn’t say how it arrived at a subjective satisfaction “apart from relying upon certain documents from the digital devices, which advertisements evidences [sic] the name of PFI alone and not of the petitioner’s trust”.
“… The respondents were not in a position to substantiate the nexus between the petitioner trust and the PFI,” the bench added.
In its writ petition, the trust in the case argued that the order freezing its bank account violated natural justice because it was neither given an opportunity to object to the action nor served the order in the first place.
Appearing for the Union government, additional solicitor general A.S.L. Sundaresan responded that the trust was not owed any opportunity for objection and said it had an “alternate remedy” under the UAPA to challenge the order before a district court.
However, the bench sided with the trust.
“… When the order itself is not served on the affected party, we are unable to comprehend as to how the trust could avail the alternate remedy, in the absence of a copy being served on them,” it said in its order.
“Thus, the failure to serve a copy of the prohibitory order on the Trust, would also amount to violation of the principles of natural justice,” the bench continued to say.
The trust also argued that the Chennai police did not have jurisdiction to serve it the prohibitory order in question but the bench said this “seems to be a misconception of the procedure contemplated under Section 7 of the Act [UAPA].”
It said the delegation of powers by the Union government was “well within the procedure” contemplated under the UAPA.
