A man from Unnao spent more than three months in jail after police arrested him without telling him why. On 29 April 2026, the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court ordered his release and directed the Uttar Pradesh government to pay him ₹10 lakh in exemplary costs — holding that the arrest was unconstitutional from the day it happened.

The division bench of Justice Abdul Moin and Justice Pramod Kumar Srivastava ruled that the arrest memo handed to Manoj Kumar when he was picked up on 27 January 2026 contained nothing more than the case crime number registered against him. That, the bench said, does not satisfy the constitutional requirement under Article 22(1), which demands that every arrested person be told, in writing, the grounds on which they are being detained.

What the arrest memo said — and what it had to say

Manoj Kumar had been named in FIR No. 244 of 2024, registered on 3 September 2024 at Police Station Asiwan in Unnao district. He was arrested more than sixteen months after the FIR, on 27 January 2026. The arrest memo — Column 13, which is where arresting officers record their reasons — listed only that case crime number. No offence was spelled out. No factual basis was offered.

The following day, the Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate-III, Unnao, remanded him to custody. His application for anticipatory bail before the Sessions Judge had already been rejected on 7 January 2026, three weeks before his arrest.

His son, Mudit Kumar, moved the Allahabad High Court by way of a habeas corpus petition. The court found in his favour at an earlier hearing on 24 April 2026, and on 29 April confirmed the order in final form, adding the cost direction.

The constitutional rule and why a case number is not enough

Article 22(1) of the Constitution provides that no person who is arrested shall be detained in custody without being informed, as soon as possible, of the grounds for such arrest. The bench relied primarily on the Supreme Court's November 2025 ruling in Mihir Rajesh Shah v. State of Maharashtra, reported at 2026 (1) SCC 500, which settled a question that had produced inconsistent practice across police forces and magistrates' courts.

In Mihir Rajesh Shah, the Supreme Court held that the obligation to furnish grounds of arrest in writing is not statute-specific — it applies to all offences, including those under the ordinary Penal Code. It flows directly from the fundamental rights in Articles 21 and 22, not merely from Section 50 of the CrPC (now Section 47 of the BNSS). The grounds must be in writing, in a language the arrested person understands, and must be supplied at the time of arrest or, in genuinely exceptional circumstances, no later than two hours before production before the Magistrate for remand.

The State of U.P. tried a familiar argument before the bench: the case crime number was in the arrest memo, and that amounts to the same thing. The Supreme Court had considered and rejected exactly that argument in Dr. Rajinder Rajan v. Union of India, 2026 Live Law (SC) 327, decided after Mihir Rajesh Shah. The Lucknow bench applied both rulings directly.

Once the arrest goes, the remand goes with it

The State also argued that even if the arrest was flawed, Manoj Kumar was now in custody under a Magistrate's remand order, and that remand order cured the original defect. The bench rejected the argument, quoting its own earlier ruling in Shivam Chaurasiya v. State of U.P. and Others, 2026:AHC-LKO:10501-DB:

“Once the edifice goes the super structure collapses.”

If the arrest is unconstitutional, the remand built on that arrest cannot survive. Subsequent remands do not launder an illegal arrest. This position tracks what the Supreme Court said in Mihir Rajesh Shah itself: filing a charge-sheet and an order taking cognizance will not validate an arrest that is per se unconstitutional for violation of Articles 21 and 22(1).

The Lucknow bench accordingly set aside the remand order dated 28 January 2026 as a consequential order flowing from the illegal arrest.

Three months in jail, ₹10 lakh in costs

The arrest happened on 27 January 2026. The final order came on 29 April 2026. That is more than three months of detention the bench characterised as illegal from inception.

The bench imposed exemplary costs of ₹10 lakh on the State authorities. The State government must pay within four weeks of receiving a certified copy of the order. It is then free to recover the amount from the officials responsible, in accordance with law.

The bench drew on the Supreme Court's observations in Mehmood Nayyar Azam v. State of Chhattisgarh, (2012) 8 SCC 1, on the psychological and dignitary harm caused by unlawful custody — treating mental anguish and humiliation as consequences that the constitutional courts are entitled to remedy through compensation in public law proceedings.

Order

The writ petition was allowed. The habeas corpus writ issued, declaring the arrest of Manoj Kumar illegal. The remand order dated 28 January 2026 was set aside. The petitioner was ordered to be released, subject to him not being required in any other case. The State of Uttar Pradesh is directed to pay ₹10 lakh to the petitioner within four weeks, with the right to recover the amount from the responsible officials. It remains open to the respondents to proceed against Manoj Kumar in the underlying matter in accordance with law.