Article 22 of the Constitution of India protect the personal liberty of a citizen?

 Article 22 of the Indian Constitution is one of the fundamental rights discussing about protection against arrest and detention in certain cases. It guarantees certain fundamental rights to every arrested person. 

Article 22(1) and (2) lay down the provisions of protection against arrested and detention in certain cases.

Article 22(1) is in two parts and it gives to persons arrested it two-fold protection. The first is that an arrested person shall not be detained in custody without being told the grounds of such an arrest and the other is that he shall be entitled to consult and to be defended by a legal practitioner of his choice.

Article 22(2) gives a third protection and it is that every person arrested and detained in custody must be produced before the nearest Magistrate within 24 hours excluding the time necessary for the journey from the place of arrest to the court of the Magistrate.

Article 22 (2) of the Constitution enjoins that every person who is arrested and detained in custody shall be produced before the nearest Magistrate within a period of twenty-four hours of such arrest excluding the time necessary for the journey from the place of arrest to the Court of the Magistrate and further mandates that no person shall be detained in custody beyond the period of 24 hours of such arrest without the authority of the Magistrate. This is the constitutional obligation on the State, which must be complied with by all those who have to make arrests in discharging their legal duties.

In Nandini Satpathy v. P. L. Dani, (1978) 3 SCR 608 Krishna Iyer, J. said that the spirit and sense of Article 22(1) is that it is fundamental to the rule of law that the services of a lawyer shall be available for consultation to any accused person under circumstances of near-custodial interrogation.

The above safeguards are not available to an enemy, alien or a person arrested or detained under a law providing for preventive detention. The Fundamental Rights, guaranteed by clauses (4) to (7) to persons detained under any law for prevention detention, relate to the maximum period of detention, the provision of an Advisory Board to consider and report on the sufficiency of the cause for detention, the right to be informed of the grounds of detention and the right to have the earliest opportunity of making a representation against the order of detention.

But the protection available in Article 22 (1) and (2) is not available to a citizen who is arrested or detained under any law providing for preventive detention. Article 22(5) provides certain safeguards to a citizen arrested under the preventive detention laws, mentioning that When any person is detained in pursuance of an order made under any law providing for preventive detention, the authority making the order shall, as soon as may be, communicate to such person the grounds on which the order has been made and shall afford him the earliest opportunity of making a representation against the order.

Clause (4) of Article 22 says that no law providing for preventive detention shall authorise the detention of a person for a longer period than three months unless-

(a) an Advisory Board consisting of persons who are, or have been, or are qualified to be appointed as, Judges of a High Court has reported before the expiration of the said period of three months that there is in its opinion sufficient cause for such detention: Provided that nothing in this sub-clause shall authorise the detention of any person beyond the maximum period prescribed by any law made by Parliament under sub-clause (b) of clause (7); or

(b) Such person is detained in accordance with the provisions of any law made by Parliament under sub-clauses (a) and (b) of clause (7).

Rajasthan High Court in Ram Singh v. State of Rajasthan, 1987 (2) WLN 394 held that the provisions relating to the detention of a citizen without trial is Draconian as it clips and trims his wings of personal liberty guaranteed to him under the Constitution.

Such a provision, being Draconian, has to be strictly constructed and levers-invented to check its misuse should be freely applied where they are available.

The framers of the Constitution, while granting these Draconian powers to the State in the shape of preventive detention laws under Article 22(2)(b), were keen to provide levers against its hasty and hurried use. It is why Clause (5) was inserted in Article 22 of the Constitution.

In State of Bombay v. Atma Ram Sridhar Vaidya, 1951 SCR 167 the Court held that Article 22 sets forth certain procedural requirements which, as a matter of constitutional necessity, must be adopted and included in any procedure that may be enacted by the legislature and it accordance with which a person may be deprived of his life or personal liberty.