The Bombay High Court at Goa ordered police to release seven protesters during a special Sunday sitting after the state could point to no written prohibitory order in force at the place where they were detained.
The seven had gathered in Panaji amid demonstrations calling for the resignation of India’s chief election commissioner. Police said permission for a protest at Azad Maidan had been refused and that the detentions were intended to prevent a law-and-order problem. The petitioners challenged the custody through urgent habeas corpus proceedings.
Justices Valmiki Menezes and Amit S Jamsandekar recorded that no order under Section 163 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita had been produced. That provision permits a magistrate to issue urgent preventive directions where immediate action is needed. In its absence, the bench said the detention may not have been authorised.
The court directed the Panaji police inspector to release the seven immediately after their lawyer undertook that they would not return to protest at Azad Maidan that night. The order preserved the larger dispute. It did not finally decide the legality of the police action, the validity of the refused permission or the boundaries of the protesters’ right to assemble.
The petitions are Malisa Simoes and Others v State of Goa and Others, WP(F) Nos. 2830 and 2831 of 2026. The state’s explanation, including its reliance on oral instructions said to have been given to police, remains to be tested when affidavits are filed.
The narrow interim ruling nevertheless turned on a basic requirement: a restriction on liberty needs identifiable legal authority. Administrative concern about a possible disturbance did not, at the emergency hearing, substitute for a written order.
Bombay High Court official order search
