Plea in SC against detention of Saifuddin Soz

The petition, filed by his wife, said he had been under detention since August 5, 2019 when the special rights given to Kashmiri people under Article 370 were removed

A habeas corpus petition was filed on Friday in the Supreme Court against the house arrest/detention of senior Congress leader and former Union Minister Saifuddin Soz for the past 10 months in Jammu and Kashmir.

The petition filed by Mumtazunnisa Soz, his wife, said he had been under detention since August 5, 2019 when the special rights given to Kashmiri people under Article 370 were removed and the State of Jammu and Kashmir was reorganised into the Union Territories of J&K and Ladakh.

“Ten months have passed since his first detention, and he is yet to be informed of his grounds of detention. All efforts by him to obtain a copy of the detention order(s) have been of no avail due to the illegal, arbitrary exercise of powers by the Government of the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir,” the petition, filed through advocate Sunil Fernandes, said.

It said his detention was wholly contrary and perverse to the constitutional safeguards laid down under the right to life and personal liberty, as well as the law on preventive detention.

“Not only does it attract the vice of unconstitutionality, it is also in stark contravention of the statutory scheme of the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act, 1978,” the petition said.