New Delhi: The Supreme Court has recently appreciated the Tamil Nadu government for taking action against cybercrime offenders under the preventive detention law.
The matter came up on Monday before a bench comprising justices Sandeep Mehta and Joymala Bagchi. The bench observed, “This is a good trend that preventive detention laws are being used against cybercrime offenders….”.
“It’s a very welcome approach,” said the bench, adding that the ordinary criminal laws were not proving “successful” to deter cybercriminals. During the hearing, a counsel, representing the state government, contended before the bench that a counter affidavit has been filed. The bench asked the registry to bring it on record and scheduled the matter for further hearing on Wednesday.
The bench was hearing a plea by the father of a detenue, suspected to be one of the members of the cybercrime gang, against the detention order.
The petitioner moved the apex court after the Madras High Court had dismissed the habeas corpus writ petition. The high court had declined to entertain the contention that the detention order violated Article 22(5) of the Indian Constitution as well as the procedures laid out under the preventive detention law.
Petitioner’s son was arrested by the Tamil Nadu Cyber Police after a complaint was filed by a cybercrime victim alleging that she had been duped of a sum of Rs 84,50,000, and a part of the crime money had gone into his current account maintained in the name of M/s Creative Craft.
It has been alleged that the accused had created four companies in his name and his family members’ names and opened multiple bank accounts to siphon off the cheated money.
A preventive detention order was issued against the petitioner’s son in August, 2024, by the district collector and the advisory board confirmed the detention on September 25, 2024. The government confirmed the detention for 12 months by order dated November 9, 2024.
It has been argued that the detenue, who hails from Punjab and his mother tongue is Punjabi, was served with documents in Tamil, Hindi and English, denying him a fair opportunity to make a representation against the order of preventive detention.
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