A person cannot be persecuted by the state authorities merely on suspicion that he or she has embraced Maoist ideology, the Kerala High Court has said.
A division bench of Chief Justice Hrishikesh Roy and Justice A K Jayasankaran Nambiar made the observation Monday while upholding a single bench order granting Rs 1 lakh compensation to a man who was illegally detained by a special squad of the Kerala Police in 2014 on suspicion of being a Maoist.
Dismissing an appeal by the state government against the single judge order to pay Rs 1 lakh to Shyam Balakrishnan, who is the son of a former High Court judge, the bench said, "The preamble to our Constitution declares that we the people of India are guaranteed liberty of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship."
The bench also said in view of the primacy that is accorded under the Constitution to a person's fundamental right to privacy and personal liberty, the police action- detaining and interrogating the petitioner and searching his house without following procedure under the Code of Criminal Procedure- was "wholly unjustified."
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