IQBAL HAMEED-UR-RAHMAN, C.J.---Through the instant constitutional petition under Article-199 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, 1973, the petitioner has made the following prayer:-- "It is therefore, respectfully prayed that the instant writ petition may please be allowed and the impugned detention order dated 9-3-2011 passed by respondent No,1 may please be set aside and respondent No,2 may please be directed to hand over the custody of the petitioner's husband to the petitioner at the time of his release.
'Any other relief which this Hon'ble Court deems just and proper may also be granted to the petitioner.
2. Precisely, the facts necessary for the adjudication of the lis in hand are that the Additional District Magistrate, Islamabad, vide Order dated 9-3-2011, in exercise of power conferred upon him under section 3 of the West Pakistan Maintenance of Public Order Ordinance, 1960 directed that Dr. Abdul Razaq son of Muhammad Ali (husband of the present petitioner) shall be immediately arrested and detained in the Central Jail, Adiala Rawalpindi for a period of 30 days on the following grounds:-
(i) That you are found involved in terrorist and anti-social activities.
(ii) That there is likelihood that you along with some other miscreants may cause damage to the government key installations and places of public importance resulting in breach of peace within the ICT and possibility of any untoward incident cannot be ruled out.
(iii) That it has further been indicated by Islamabad Police that you have sympathies for proscribed organizations and groups that are likely to indulge in activities which would destroy the peace in Islamabad.
(iv) That the recent assassination of Federal Minister, Shahbaz Bhatti shows that miscreants like you have reassembled in the Capital.
3. Learned counsel for the petitioner has argued with vehemence, that the husband of the petitioner is behind the bars for the last more than two years due to involvement in case F.I.R. No,34 of 2009 dated 29-1-2009 registered at Police Station Saddar Baruni, Rawalpindi. Subsequently, the petitioner's husband was convicted in the said criminal case. The conviction order was assailed by filing appeal before the Sessions Court, which was dismissed. Thereafter, the petitioner's husband filed a Criminal Revision No, 25 of 2011, before the Hon'ble Lahore High Court, Rawalpindi Bench, Rawalpindi, and the Hon'ble Lahore High Court, suspended the sentence of the petitioner's husband vide order dated 1-3-2011. In furtherance of the said order, ball bonds for the release of the petitioner's husband 'were also submitted before the Deputy Registrar (Judicial), Lahore High Court, Rawalpindi Bench, Rawalpindi. The petitioner has now come to know that a detention Order dated 9-3-2011 has also been passed by the Additional District Magistrate, Islamabad in respect of her husband, which is illegal, because no material is available with respondent No,1 to pass the impugned detention order and mere involvement/conviction of the petitioner's husband in a criminal case does not form the basis for passing the impugned preventive detention order.
4. Conversely, learned Addl: Attorney-General argued that the petitioner's husband is a convict and sufficient material is available with the detaining authority to its satisfaction to pass the impugned detention order; that the petitioner's husband has the sympathies with the proscribed organizations/groups and even during his detention in the Jail his links with the gangs involved in subversive activities have been detected.
5. I have heard the learned counsel for the petitioner as well as learned Addl: Attorney-General and perused the record.
6. The Hon'ble Supreme Court of Pakistan in Federation of Pakistan through Secretary, Ministry of Interior, Islamabad versus Mrs. Amatul Jalil Khawaja (PLD 2003 Supreme Court 442) has held that an order of preventive detention has to satisfy the following requirements:-- "(i) the Court must be satisfied that the material before the detaining authority was such that a reasonable person would be satisfied as to the necessity for making the order of preventive detention; (ii) that satisfaction should be established with regard to each of the grounds of detention, and, if one of the grounds is shown to be bad, non-existing or irrelevant, the whole order of detention would be rendered invalid; (iii) that initial burden lies on the detaining authority to show the legality of the preventive detention and (iv) that the detaining authority must place the whole material, upon which the order of detention is based, before the Court notwithstanding its claim of privilege with respect to any document, the validity of which claim shall be within the competence of the Court to decide." In addition to these requirements, the court has further to be satisfied, in cases of preventive detention, that the order of detention was made by the authority prescribed in the law relating to preventive detention; that each of the requirements of the law relating to preventive detention had been strictly complied with; that "satisfaction" in fact existed with regard to the necessity of preventive detention of the detenue; that the grounds of detention had been furnished within the period prescribed by law, and if no such period is prescribed, then "as soon as may be"; that the grounds of detention should not be vague and indefinite and should be comprehensive enough to enable the detenue to make representation against his detention to the authority prescribed by law; that the grounds of detention are not irrelevant to the aim and object of this law and that the detention should not be for extraneous considerations or for purposes which may be attacked on the ground of malice.
7. In the instant case the grounds of the detention order are as under:--
(i) That you are found involved in terrorist and antisocial activities.
(ii) That there is likelihood that you along with some other miscreants may cause damage to the government key installations and places of public importance resulting in breach of peace within the ICT and possibility of any untoward incident cannot be ruled out.
(iii) That it has further been indicated by Islamabad Police that you have sympathies for proscribed organizations and groups that are likely to indulge in activities which would destroy the peace in Islamabad.
(iv) That the recent assassination of Federal Minister, Shahbaz Bhatti shows that miscreants like you have reassembled in the Capital.
8. The petitioner's husband is behind the bars since 29-1-2009 and the impugned detention order has been passed by respondent No,1 on 9-3-2011. The impugned detention order does not carry reasonable material to detain the petitioner's husband further and to curb his liberty which is a fundamental right of every citizen guaranteed under Articles 9 and 10 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, 1.973. The impugned detention order dated 9-3-2011 appears to have been passed merely on presumptions and apprehensions, which have not been substantiated through specific allegations. The petitioner's husband being behind the bars for the last two years could not be considered as having caused immediate breach of peace within the territorial limits of ICT. Moreover, it is quite astonishing that the Additional District Magistrate has mentioned a ground in the impugned detention order dated 9-3-2011 that the assassination of Federal Minister, Shahbaz Bhatti, shows that miscreants like the petitioner's husband have reassembled in the Capital, while there is no deviation from the record that the petitioner's husband is detained in Adiala jail, Rawalpindi, since 29-1-2009. The grounds of impugned detention order are vague and indefinite which could not entail the detention of petitioner's husband under section 3 of the West Pakistan Maintenance of Public Order Ordinance, 1960 on the ground of assumption that he has sympathies with the proscribed organizations. The material before the detaining authority was not of such nature that a reasonable person would be satisfied to the necessity for making the order of preventive detention, as such, the requirements of law relating to preventive detention have also not been complied with.
9. In view of the above perspective, I find that the order of detention does not fulfil the parameters of law as well as the criteria laid down by the apex Court. The detention order seems to have been passed in a mechanical manner without any reasonable justification and application of mind, therefore, instant writ petition is accepted and the impugned detention order dated 9-3-2011, regarding detention of petitioner's husband i,e, Dr. Abdul Razaq son of Muhammad Ali is declared to have been passed illegally, hence, not sustainable in law and is hereby set aside.