Sooraj Pal Yadav vs State of U.P.& Ors.

Kamleshwar Nath, J.—The petition under Article 226 of the Constitution is for issue of a writ of habeas corpus to set the petitioner Sooraj Pal Yadav at liberty and the only ground canvassed before us is that in making the arrest of the petitioner in compliance of the provisions of Section 50 (1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure and Article 22 (1) of the Constitution of India was not made.

The arrest of the petitioner was made on 1871987 at about 1 p. m. in connection with Case Crime No. 174 of 1986 registered at Police Station Cant. Lucknow for offence under Sections 147, 148, 149, 364, 207 of the Indian Penal Code and 2/3 (1) of the U. P. Gangsters and Prevention of AntiSocial Activities Act, 1986. When the police party attempted to arrest the petitioner, he and his companions fired at the party but they were captured and illicit arms were recovered from the petitioner''s possession. On that basis an F. I. R. was lodged by the Inspector Incharge Inam Chandra at the said Police Station on the same day, on the basis of which a Case Crime No. 183 of 1987 under Sections 147, 148, 149 and 307 of the Indian Penal Code was registered against the petitioner.

The question for consideration was whether at the time of the arrest of the petitioner at about 1 p. m. in connection with the aforesaid offences the arresting officer, namely, Inspector Incharge Inam Chandra had complied with the provisions of Section 50 (1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure and Article 22 (i) of the Constitution of India.

The learned counsel for the parties agree that these very questions had arisen in respect of these very offences in Writ Petitions No. 5582 of 1987, 581 of 1987 and 5817 of 1987 filed respectively by Raja Ram, Manoj Kumar and Dinesh Kumar where it was found by this Court on 13101987 that the compliance of the aforesaid provisions had not been made. The petitions were allowed and the petitioners in those cases were directed to be set at liberty forthwith. Since all the matters arising in the present case were considered and determined in the abovementioned writ petitions, the reasons recorded in the judgments of those writ petitions apply equally to the present writ petition. For those reasons, we allow this writ petition and directed the petitioner Sooraj Pal Yadav to be released and set at liberty forthwith unless wanted in any other case in accordance with law. It would be open to the concerned authorities to rearrest the petitioner in accordance with and on full compliance of the law.

Writ allowed.