New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday stayed the operation of an Allahabad High Court order insofar as it imposed costs of Rs 10 lakh on the Uttar Pradesh government and its officials in a habeas corpus matter involving the alleged illegal arrest and continued incarceration of a man in Unnao district.
A Bench of Justices Prashant Kumar Mishra and Sanjeev Sachdeva passed the interim order while hearing a special leave petition (SLP) filed by the Uttar Pradesh government and other authorities challenging the April 29 judgment of the Allahabad High Court’s Lucknow Bench in a habeas corpus petition filed by Manoj Kumar.
Issuing notice on the SLP, the apex court directed that the matter be listed after eight weeks. “Issue notice, returnable in eight weeks,” the Justice Mishra-led Bench ordered.
It further directed that, “In the meanwhile, the impugned order insofar as it relates to the imposition of cost of Rs. 10 lakhs on the petitioners as mentioned in paragraph nos. 13 and 16 of the impugned order, shall remain stayed.”
The SLP before the Supreme Court arises from a judgment of the Allahabad High Court, which had declared the arrest of Manoj Kumar illegal and set aside the remand order passed against him, holding that the authorities had failed to comply with the constitutional requirement of furnishing written grounds of arrest.
Relying extensively on recent Supreme Court decisions, including Mihir Rajesh Shah v. State of Maharashtra and Dr Rajinder Rajan v. Union of India, a Division Bench of Justices Abdul Moin and Pramod Kumar Srivastava had held that informing an arrested person of the grounds of arrest is “not a mere formality but a mandatory, binding constitutional safeguard”.
The Allahabad High Court observed that the arrest memo merely referred to the case crime number without disclosing the grounds of arrest and concluded that the petitioner’s arrest on January 27, 2026, was illegal.
It further held that the remand order passed the following day was liable to be set aside as it flowed from an unlawful arrest.
While allowing the habeas corpus petition, the High Court had directed the immediate release of the petitioner, subject to his not being wanted in any other case, and imposed exemplary costs of Rs 10 lakh on the state authorities.
The amount was directed to be paid initially by the state government, with liberty to recover it from the officials found responsible in accordance with law.
The Allahabad High Court had reasoned that the petitioner had remained in custody for more than three months because of a “gross violation” of constitutional safeguards laid down by the Supreme Court and said the authorities had “flagrantly violated” the law governing arrests.
(IANS)
