Allahabad HC Awards Compensation for 24-Hour Illegal Police Detention, Moulds Relief Beyond Formal Prayer
A Division Bench held that Sub-Inspector Surya Prakash Dubey violated Article 21 by locking up a citizen over a domestic dispute, and directed the State to pay Rs. 35,000 with liberty to recover from Dubey.
The Allahabad High Court has directed the State of Uttar Pradesh to pay ad hoc compensation of Rs. 25,000 and costs of Rs. 10,000 to a resident of Varanasi who was dragged from his home by a police officer and confined in a police lockup for 24 hours without any lawful authority. The Division Bench of Justice J.J. Munir and Justice Sanjiv Kumar, with the judgment delivered by Justice Munir, found that the detention arose from a domestic dispute in which the police had no business to act, that the officer's counter affidavit contained no specific denial of the core allegation, and that the proceedings subsequently drawn under Section 107/116 of the Code of Criminal Procedure were a cover to justify what had already been done. Because the petitioner had not formally claimed monetary compensation, the bench exercised its power to mould relief, holding that the absence of a formal prayer cannot deprive the court of jurisdiction to remedy a brazen violation of Article 21.
The Dispute Before the Court
Matambar Mishra, a resident of Mehmoorganj, Varanasi, had come to his native village Sidhwar, Tehsil and Police Station Handia, District Prayagraj, to tend to his agricultural land. On 26 November 2022, after returning from his fields at around 3.00 p.m., one Surya Prakash Dubey — then In-charge of Police Outpost Baraut, P.S. Handia — entered his house, dragged him out dressed only in a lungi and kurta, and took him first to Police Outpost Baraut and then to P.S. Handia. The petitioner repeatedly asked Dubey the reason for his detention; Dubey abused him and gave no answer. Mishra was kept in the lockup of P.S. Handia from 26 November 2022 to 27 November 2022 — a period of approximately 24 hours.
During that detention, the petitioner alleged that Dubey demanded a bribe of Rs. 20,000 as the price of his release. His younger brother sought help from an advocate of the District Court, Allahabad, but every approach was met with the same demand. The petitioner was ultimately released on 27 November 2022 at 4.00 p.m., but only after, as he averred, paying the demanded sum. A resident of the petitioner's village, Devi Shankar Mishra, had visited him in the lockup on the evening of 26 November 2022 and brought him food cooked at his home.
The underlying complaint against the petitioner had come from Ritika, described as his brother's daughter-in-law, alleging domestic violence. Complaints about the illegal detention were sent by the petitioner's son, Ashish Kumar Mishra, an advocate practising in Delhi, to the Chief Minister of U.P., the Director General of Police, and the Commissioner of Police, Prayagraj. The Commissioner directed the Assistant Commissioner of Police, Handia, Prayagraj to inquire into the matter. The ACP submitted a report on 28 December 2022 rejecting the complaint — without recording the statement of the petitioner, his son, or Devi Shankar Mishra, who had witnessed the detention first-hand.
The writ petition originally sought quashing of that inquiry report. That prayer was deleted by the Division Bench on 14 March 2023, and notice was issued on the remaining reliefs, including a direction for a fresh inquiry by a superior police officer and the residual clause seeking any other appropriate writ or direction.
Why Section 107/116 Proceedings Could Not Stand
Three days after the petitioner's release, on 29 November 2022, proceedings were initiated against him under Section 107/116 Cr.P.C. The petitioner's case was that these were a cover to retrospectively justify the illegal detention. The bench agreed.
Section 107/116 proceedings under Chapter VIII of the Cr.P.C. are designed to preserve public peace and tranquility. They are triggered where there is a likelihood of breach of peace or disturbance of public tranquility. The bench held that a domestic dispute between the petitioner and his brother's daughter-in-law was entirely outside that remit. No FIR or even a non-cognizable report had been registered. If the facts did not support registration of any offence, they could not support security proceedings either. Ritika's remedy, the bench observed, lay in approaching the learned Magistrate under the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, 2005.
The fifth respondent — the Additional District Magistrate (Judicial), Etah — filed a counter affidavit that effectively conceded the point. Paragraphs 8 and 9 of that affidavit stated that the notice under Section 111 Cr.P.C. was issued solely on the basis of a challani report from P.S. Handia, that the domestic nature of the dispute was not brought to the respondent's attention, and that the notice was never served on the petitioner and had since lapsed. The respondent tendered an unconditional apology to the court for the oversight. The bench relied on the Bombay High Court's decision in Fayyaz Shamshoddin Attar v. State of Maharashtra and others, 2015 SCC OnLine Bom 9012, which held that a purely matrimonial dispute cannot attract Section 107 Cr.P.C. where no cognizable or non-cognizable offence has been registered.
How the Bench Read Dubey's Counter Affidavit
Dubey filed a personal counter affidavit dated 3 December 2025. The bench examined it closely and found that it contained no specific denial of the petitioner's allegation that he was dragged from his home and confined in the lockup from 26 to 27 November 2022. What Dubey offered instead was an account drawn from General Diary Entry No. 23 dated 27 November 2022: that the petitioner and Ritika both came to Police Outpost Baraut and mutually agreed to a compromise, which was reduced to writing by their advocate, Mr. Rahul Mishra, without any pressure from the police.
The bench found this account implausible on its face. A man who had been dragged from his home in a lungi and kurta, without being told why, would not walk voluntarily into a police outpost to amicably settle a domestic dispute. The bench observed that Dubey was not a spiritual guide or community leader to whom parties would head out voluntarily. He was a police officer who possessed the coercive authority of the State. The gap between Ritika's complaint reaching Dubey and the petitioner appearing at the outpost to sign a compromise was, in the bench's words, a gaping flaw in Dubey's account. In the absence of a specific denial, the fact of illegal detention was deemed admitted.
On the bribe allegation, the bench declined to make a finding, holding that the question of whether Dubey demanded and received Rs. 20,000 was properly within the remit of the disciplinary authority, the Vigilance Establishment, or the Anti-Corruption Bureau.
Moulding Relief Where No Compensation Was Formally Claimed
The petitioner's surviving formal prayer was only for a direction to hold a fresh inquiry into Dubey's conduct by a superior police officer. When the bench pointed out that no relief had been claimed on the foot of an Article 21 violation, counsel for the petitioner made an oral prayer for monetary compensation. The bench held that the absence of a formal prayer for compensation could not deprive it of jurisdiction to remedy a brazen violation of the most fundamental right to liberty.
For this proposition, the bench drew on the Supreme Court's decision in M. Sudakar v. V. Manoharan and others, (2011) 1 SCC 484, which held that the power to mould relief is always available to a court possessed of the power to issue high prerogative writs, and that a writ petitioner's failure to claim a specific relief does not preclude the court from granting what he is otherwise entitled to. The bench also referred to the Orissa High Court's Division Bench decision in Berhampur University and another v. Ganesh Chandra Behera and others, 2021 SCC OnLine Ori 2399, which applied the same principle to cut through the clutter and do complete justice.
The bench further noted the principle, drawn from the Delhi High Court's decision in Pankaj Kumar Sharma v. Govt. of NCT of Delhi and others, 2023 SCC OnLine Del 6215, and from the Supreme Court's observations in D.K. Basu and Nilabati Behera v. State of Orissa, (1993) 2 SCC 746, that a claim in public law for compensation for unconstitutional deprivation of liberty is based on strict liability and is available in addition to any private law remedy in tort. The constitutional court's award of compensation is an exercise of public law jurisdiction to penalise the wrongdoer and fix liability on the State for failing to protect a citizen's fundamental rights.
The bench also referred to its own earlier Division Bench decision in Shiv Kumar Verma and another v. State of U.P. and another, 2021(5) ADJ 493 (DB), which had taken note of a State Government policy dated 23 March 2021 providing for payment of Rs. 25,000 as compensation for illegal detention of any citizen by a State officer, along with initiation of disciplinary proceedings against the officer concerned.
The bench added a candid observation about the structural problem: civil courts in Uttar Pradesh have, over decades, effectively lost the working authority — if not the formal jurisdiction — to try suits for compensation arising from torts committed by administrative functionaries. This has pushed such claims into the writ jurisdiction of the High Court, where any compensation awarded must necessarily be ad hoc in nature.
Outcome
The writ petition was allowed with costs. Respondent Nos. 1, 2 and 3 — the State of U.P. through the Additional Chief Secretary (Home), the Director General of Police, and the Commissioner of Police, Prayagraj — were directed by mandamus to pay the petitioner ad hoc compensation of Rs. 25,000 within thirty days of communication of the order. Costs were quantified at Rs. 10,000. The State was granted liberty to recover the compensation and costs from Dubey after payment to the petitioner, including by deduction from his remuneration or other funds held by the respondents.
The bench clarified that it remains open to the petitioner to bring a regular suit for damages before a court of competent jurisdiction, and that any compensation awarded in such proceedings shall take into account the ad hoc sum granted here.
The Registrar (Compliance) was directed to communicate the judgment to the Additional Chief Secretary (Home), Government of U.P., Lucknow; the Commissioner of Police, Prayagraj; the Assistant Commissioner of Police, Handia, Prayagraj; and Surya Prakash Dubey, the then In-charge of Police Outpost Baraut, P.S. Handia, District Prayagraj.