The Punjab and Haryana High Court on Thursday upheld the preventive detention of Khadoor Sahib MP Amritpal Singh under the National Security Act (NSA), dismissing his petition and ruling that the State’s action was backed by “sufficient material” and did not warrant judicial interference.

Dismissing the plea filed under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution, the division bench of Chief Justice Sheel Nagu and Justice Sanjiv Berry held that “we do not find any infirmity/illegality therein so as to call for any interference,” adding that the detention order was “immuned from the powers of judicial review.”

The petition had sought quashing of the detention order dated April 17, 2025, passed by the Amritsar District Magistrate, under which the petitioner was detained with effect from April 23, 2025, following earlier detention orders in 2023 and 2024.

At the outset, the court recorded that the petitioner’s counsel “candidly admitted that the order of preventive detention is not being challenged on any procedural lapse, but on merits of the allegations.”

The bench then proceeded to examine the grounds of detention, noting that they “reveal… activities/involvement/association of the petitioner with elements which gave rise to the apprehension of potential danger to the breach of public order.”

Among the allegations cited were “conspiring with anti-national elements”, “association with dreaded gangsters and terrorists”, and “campaigning the cause of Khalistan separatist.” The court also took note of claims that the petitioner sought to “physically eliminate persons who have the potentiality to publicly expose [his] misdeeds.”

Referring to the murder of Gurpreet Singh Harinau, the bench observed that the material on record included witness statements indicating that “plans were being made to use drug money for smuggling dangerous weapons into the country for the ultimate object of creating a Khalistan State,” which the court described as “direct proof of raging war against the State.”

The judgment further noted that an Intelligence Wing communication had identified 15 individuals allegedly on a “hit-list”, and that the killing of Harinau had “confirm[ed] the aforesaid apprehension… into reality,” leading to a “fear psychosis… thereby creating live and present danger to public order.”

Rejecting the argument that there was no application of mind by the District Magistrate, the court held that “the material available on record reveals that there was sufficient material… to safely arrive at a reasonable satisfaction that if the petitioner is not preventively detained, then the situation of breach of public order and security of the State may arise.”

A key challenge raised by the petitioner was against the State government’s April 15, 2025 order empowering all District Magistrates and Commissioners of Police under Section 3(3) of the NSA. The petitioner argued that such delegation must be “district/incident/event centric” and that a “generic order giving wide and sweeping powers” was legally untenable.

The bench, however, rejected this contention, holding that the statute does not impose such a limitation. Interpreting Sections 3(2) and 3(3) of the NSA, the court observed that the expression “circumstances prevailing or likely to prevail in any area” does not restrict the State to issuing only incident-specific orders.

“The text of section 3(3)… does not prevent the State Government from passing a generic order… authorizing all the District Magistrates and Commissioners of Police within the State of Punjab,” the court held, adding that “something which is palpable… from the plain reading… cannot be introduced by purposive interpretation.”

It further ruled that “if the statute had any such intention… it would have expressed the same in the text,” concluding that the April 15 order was “rightly issued in generic terms.”

On the broader question of preventive detention, the bench emphasised that the “grounds are clearly indicative of reasonable apprehension… based on subjective satisfaction founded upon objective material” that the petitioner posed a threat to public order and state security.

The court also noted that procedural safeguards under the NSA had been followed, including approval of the detention by the State government and the Advisory Board’s opinion that “there is sufficient cause for the detention.”

Distinguishing a series of Supreme Court and High Court rulings cited by the petitioner, the bench held that those cases either involved procedural lapses or different factual matrices and were “of no avail” in the present case.

Concluding that the detention order was legally sustainable, the court said, “in the conspectus of above discussion, it is clear as day light that the impugned order… is immuned from the powers of judicial review,” and dismissed the petition without costs.