The Supreme Court on Wednesday ordered releasing NewsClick founder and editor in-chief Prabir Purkayastha saying his arrest by the Delhi Police under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act 1967 was “illegal”.
The apex court further noted that the remand application copy was not provided to Purkayastha or his counsel before passing the remand order on October 4 last year and therefore, it has held the arrest as well as the remand ‘void’.
The top court, however, ordered that Purkayastha’s release will be subject to him furnishing the bail and bonds to the satisfaction of the trial Court, since chargesheet has been filed.
The verdict was delivered by a bench of Justices BR Gavai and Sandeep Mehta after having concluded arguments on April 30.
“There is no hesitation in the mind of the Court to reach to a conclusion that a copy of the remand application, in the purported exercise of the communication of the grounds of arrest in writing, was not provided to the accused-appellant or his counsel before the passing of the remand order dated 4th October, 2023, which vitiates the arrest and the subsequent remand of the appellant. As a result, the appellant is entitled to a direction for release from custody by applying the ration of the judgment rendered by this court in Pankaj Bansal,” the Court pronounced.
Purkayastha moved the SC challenging the legality of his arrest by contending that the grounds of arrest were not supplied to him in writing as mandated by the apex court’s judgment in Pankaj Bansal. The Delhi police contended that the grounds of arrest were contained in the remand application.
The court, during the hearing, noted that the remand order was recorded to have been passed on October 4, 2023 at 4 am, however, copy of the remand application was served on Purkayastha’s lawyer much later.
Purkayastha and NewsClick HR head Amit Chakravarty were arrested by the Special Cell of Delhi Police last year on October 3 on charges of taking money from China to “disrupt the sovereignty of India” and cause disaffection against the country. According to the FIR, a large amount of funds to run the news site came from China.
The police claimed Purkayastha conspired with a group – People’s Alliance for Democracy and Secularism – to sabotage the electoral process during the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.
On October 3, 2023, raids were conducted at 88 locations across Delhi and seven in other states on the suspects named in the FIR and those that surfaced in the analysis of data.
During the searches, around 300 electronic gadgets were seized from the offices of NewsClick and the residences of the journalists who were examined.
With inputs from agencies
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SC orders immediate release of NewsClick founder, calls arrest invalid
