New Delhi: A “pre-typed” detention order, a “prescribed printed proforma”, too few cases to justify invoking an extraordinary preventive detention law, only for the court to find that the legal threshold had not been met. This is the recurring script in Uttar Pradesh’s use of preventive powers under two laws—the National Security Act (NSA) and the state’s Goondas Act—as a review of Allahabad High Court (HC) orders between 2024 and 2026 shows.
Both laws—one central and the other state—allow the government to curtail a person’s liberty preventively on the premise that they may threaten public order.
The recent Allahabad HC judgment quashing the NSA order issued by Noida District Magistrate (DM) Medha Roopam against student activist Aakriti Chaudhary was not an anomaly. In multiple cases, the HC has identified the route taken by DMs to invoke such stringent laws, only to quash the orders and set the petitioners free.
Last week, a bench of Justices Atul Sreedharan and Achal Sachdev came down heavily on Gautam Buddha Nagar DM Medha Roopam for invoking the NSA against Chaudhary following the Noida workers’ protests. The HC ordered that the 25-year-old be compensated and directed the recovery of Rs 5 lakh from the salaries of the DM and all officers who may have been responsible, including the Station House Officer (SHO) who prepared the initial report recommending her detention under the NSA.
On Wednesday, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta informed the Supreme Court that the UP government would challenge the Allahabad HC order.
An order under the National Security Act (NSA), 1980, allows the government to detain a person for up to 12 months without formal charges or trial to prevent them from acting in a manner prejudicial to national security or public order.
Under the Uttar Pradesh Control of Goondas Act, 1970, a District Magistrate can restrict a person’s movement, bar them from entering specified local areas (externment) or require them to report regularly to a police station if they are considered a threat to public order. For the law to be invoked, grounds such as habitual criminality, danger to the community, or conduct that causes alarm, danger or harm to people or property must be proven.
The Supreme Court on Tuesday also questioned whether a confession statement by an accused can form the basis for detention under the NSA. A bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and Sheel Nagu raised the legality of the NSA detention of an accused alleged to be the mastermind behind the 2024 Sambhal violence.
Justice Datta orally noted that preventive detention is not a judicial function but an administrative discretion that must be exercised in accordance with applicable guidelines. In the absence of such guidelines, the authority must “be reasonable and fair”, he said.
ThePrint details the reasons cited by DMs for invoking these stringent laws and the grounds on which courts quashed them—from orders being “pre-typed” to the social impact of labelling someone a ‘goonda’.
Pre-typed orders and elevating ordinary crime to NSA level
In July this year, the Allahabad HC quashed an order issued under the NSA by the Jalaun DM against two men accused of extortion, robbery, mischief and criminal intimidation.
The court said the order showed that “it is a pre-typed detention order which was placed before the detaining authority over which he (DM) has simply put his signature and the date was also filled in the handwriting of some of his officials working in his office”. The accused, Shadab Khan and Majid Khan, had challenged the NSA order before the high court.
The court also flagged procedural failures, saying the petitioner’s representation was examined by the central government “in a most tardy manner and the decision was taken after almost 17 days”—rendering the preventive detention illegal.
The court said that “the central or state government could have detained a person for maintaining public order and there is difference between public order and law and order problem and if there was a disturbance to public order, then the tempo of life of the community as a whole would be disturbed, whereas in the present case there is no such situation which has occurred”.
Therefore, the order said, “it cannot be termed as a disturbance of public order, at most it can be a problem of law and order…the criminal law is sufficient to deal with such a situation”. However, it added, “the DM of Jalaun passed the impugned detention order merely on the basis of the police report”.
In the same month, the HC quashed an order issued under the Goondas Act by the Amethi DM, noting that the petitioner’s involvement in two criminal cases—one in 2021 and the other in 2025—did not establish that he was a habitual offender, a necessary ground for such action. The court also noted there was no allegation that he posed a threat to public order or that the case could not be dealt with under ordinary penal law.
Earlier in May, the HC quashed two orders issued by the Varanasi Commissioner under the Goondas Act against a man facing two cases—one involving rioting and criminal intimidation, and another involving kidnapping, criminal intimidation and sexual assault of a minor.
The accused challenged the orders, arguing they were based merely on two cases and that he had not been convicted in either. Justice Sandeep Jain allowed the petition, observing that “merely on the basis of one or two criminal cases, a person cannot be branded as a ‘Goonda’.”
“Such punitive action of the State causes irreparable damage to the reputation of such (a) person and his family,” the order said.
In another May case, the HC quashed an NSA order issued by the Sambhal DM against two men accused of slaughtering cows and transporting them. They were accused of “disturbing” the sentiments of the Hindu community and disrupting public law and order.
The HC observed that while cow slaughtering is a crime in the state, it was undisputed that the alleged incident occurred within the four boundaries of a house and not in a public place—a necessary element to constitute a crime. Noting that there was no violence, disturbance of public peace and order or communal disharmony, and that only one cow was slaughtered, the court held that the detention order was unsustainable in “law or fact”.
‘Rampant misuse’
In a July 2024 order, the HC quashed an order issued by the Mau DM under the Goondas Act, coming down heavily on the “rampant misuse” of the preventive law.
The petitioner, Chandan Rana, was embroiled in a dispute over temple land between two parties and faced another criminal case relating to the same property. Since only two cases were registered against him, the court found the order legally unsustainable.
While quashing it, Justice Siddharth said the DM must exercise “all caution and care” before invoking such extraordinary and unusual powers. He added, “But we are noticing that there is a rampant misuse of provisions of this enactment”.
He further said, “The executive authorities for the extraneous consideration exercising this extraordinary powers at their whims and capricious and are issuing notices on a solitary case or some beat reports.” This, he said, made the severity of the deterrent law “blunt”.
“The indiscreet exercise of provisions of Goonda Act and sending the notices to the persons is not based on executive authorities’ sweet will or choice. Issuing notice on solitary case(s) is quite irritating and unnecessarily, there is piling up of litigation”, he added.
The court noted that the notices in the case were issued on “a ‘prescribed printed proforma’ without application of mind by the executive authorities.
“Not only this, except enumeration of pending solitary case and a beat report, there is total lack of any judicial mind spelling out the general nature of material allegations against the petitioner, making (the) entire impugned notice per se defective and cannot be acted upon any further,” said the HC.
The court recorded its “strong displeasure in such type of routine pasting of such provisions” of the Goondas Act and the UP Gangsters and Anti-Social Activities (Prevention) Act, 1986 in a “most capricious and casual way”.
The high court directed the UP government to formulate uniform guidelines on the applicability of the Goondas Act.
In September 2024, the HC quashed an NSA order issued by the Ghaziabad DM against a man accused of rioting and murder. He had been issued at least four orders within 15 days, directing him to remain in preventive detention for one year.
However, the court noted that his name did not appear in the FIR and instead surfaced in a supplementary statement, where he was identified as one of the assailants initially referred to as an unknown person. No overt act was attributed to him, the court noted.
A bench of Justices Arvind Singh Sangwan and Mod. Azhar Husain Idrisi also noted that the petitioner had made objections and a representation to the DM on 30 grounds, primarily arguing that he had not been given a proper opportunity of hearing, that the report forming the basis of his detention had not been supplied, and that due procedure had not been followed. He also pointed out that two other FIRs forming the basis of the case were registered in Haryana, not Uttar Pradesh.
Responding to the UP government counsel’s submission that the accused had secured bail in multiple cases except the NSA case, the court emphasised the settled principle that the NSA “cannot be invoked just to deter a person from exercising his right to apply for bail” before the court.
In an April 2024 order, the HC, while quashing a show-cause notice issued by the Moradabad district administration against one Mohd Umair, noted that despite an earlier order, “the state government has not bothered to issue any guidelines to the District Magistrates regarding applicability of the Act and the District Magistrates and their subordinates are continuously issuing illegal notices” under the Goondas Act.
The court noted that Umair, who was accused of abducting women or girls, was not a habitual offender and that this was “a solitary case registered against him”.
A division bench of Justices Surendra Singh and Siddharth held that the Moradabad DM had issued the show-cause notice “in abuse of power vested in him by law and has acted against the presumption of fairness in due discharge of his official duties”. The court quashed the notice and directed the UP government to pay Rs 1 lakh to the petitioner.
Almost all these orders rely on the landmark Govardhan v State of UP (2023), in which the HC said that “this adjective ‘Goonda’ itself carries bundle load of bad name, and the executive authorities casually and irresponsibly brand a person as a Goonda, goes without saying, that his entire future and reputation would go to dogs and cause irreparable damage to his name and reputation of his family”.
(Edited by Chingkheinganbi Mayengbam)
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