IN HIS DISSENTING OPINION in Liversidge vs. Anderson (1942), Lord Atkin valiantly said,
“In England, amidst clash of arms, the laws are not silent. They may be changed but they speak the same language in war as in peace. It is always been one of the pillars of freedom, one of the principles of liberty for which on recent authority we are now fighting, that the judges are no respecters of persons, and stand between the subject and any attempted encroachments on his liberty by the executive, alert to see that any coercive action is justified in law.”
Lord Atkin’s dissent is widely celebrated as a progressive intervention in the jurisprudence of civil liberty. However, the actions of the Indian judiciary regarding the State’s recurring use of preventive detention measures to curb free speech suggest a starkly different story. It is frightening how silent the courts can be amidst brutal violations of civil liberties.
Renewed concerns over preventive detention
On October 2, Gitanjali Angmo, wife of 59-year-old engineer-turned-teacher-turned-climate activist Sonam Wangchuk, approached the Supreme Court of India seeking information about her husband’s whereabouts. Mr. Wangchuk had been detained under the National Security Act, 1980 (‘NSA’) —India’s most sweeping preventive detention law—by the Ladakh police on September 26. His arrest was linked to the September 24 violence in Leh, which left four dead and nearly 150 injured.
