The Supreme Court on Friday ordered the immediate release of a law student from Madhya Pradesh who was detained under the National Security Act (NSA), calling the preventive detention “wholly untenable” and finding several procedural lapses in the state’s actions.
A bench comprising Justices Ujjal Bhuyan and K. Vinod Chandran passed the order in favour of Annu alias Aniket, a law student from Betul district, who was detained under the NSA on July 11, 2024, following an altercation with a professor on a university campus. He was initially booked for attempt to murder and other related offences. While already in jail for those charges, a preventive detention order under Section 3(2) of the NSA was issued against him and extended periodically, most recently up to July 12, 2025.
The court, however, held that the reasons cited in the detention order did not meet the threshold required under the Act. “Preventive detention of the appellant, therefore, becomes wholly untenable,” the bench observed in its interim order, noting that a detailed, reasoned judgment would follow.
The top court criticised multiple aspects of the detention process. It found fault with the District Magistrate of Betul for deciding on the detainee’s representation himself without forwarding it to the state government — a violation of the statutory safeguards under the NSA. The bench also noted the absence of a valid explanation for initiating preventive detention despite the appellant already being in custody under criminal proceedings.
“The scenario, which thus emerges, is that the appellant continues to remain in custody only by virtue of the order of preventive detention,” the court remarked, directing Annu’s release from Bhopal Central Jail unless he is required to be held in connection with any other pending case.
While the Madhya Pradesh government sought to justify the detention by citing nine criminal cases against Annu, his counsel submitted that he had been acquitted in five, convicted with only a fine in one, and was on bail in the remaining two. In the latest case registered last year, the law student was granted bail on January 28, 2025.
The Supreme Court’s ruling overturns the February 25 decision of the Madhya Pradesh High Court, which had dismissed a habeas corpus plea filed by Annu’s father. The High Court had relied on the student’s alleged criminal history to uphold the NSA detention, holding that the District Magistrate’s subjective satisfaction was sufficient to invoke the preventive measure.
