Supreme Court Warns: Externment Not Routine, Cases Alone No Ground
The Supreme Court bench made these observations while quashing an externment order passed in November last year.
By Sumit Saxena
Published : August 31, 2026 at 9:12 PM IST
New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday underscored that externment orders strike at the heart of fundamental freedoms and cannot be passed casually or on mere assertion. The top court clarified that the mere registration of multiple criminal cases against an individual does not, by itself, justify such a drastic measure.
A bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and Sheel Nagu said: "An order of externment directly impinges upon valuable fundamental freedoms guaranteed to a citizen and, therefore, cannot be made as a matter of routine or on mere ipse dixit. Further, merely because multiple criminal cases have been registered against a person would not, ipso facto, be a ground for ordering externment."
The bench made these observations while quashing an externment order passed in November last year against a man who was directed to remove himself from the territorial limits of Raigarh and contiguous districts in Chhattisgarh for one year.
The bench said before exercising such power, the district magistrate is required to arrive at a bona fide and informed subjective satisfaction that the circumstances of the case warrant such an extreme measure and that externment is necessary to prevent the apprehended mischief.
Although the authority is not expected to render a judgment in the manner expected of a court of law, the order must nonetheless disclose, at least in broad terms, the reasons which persuaded it to arrive at such satisfaction, it added.
The bench said the existence of objective material and a discernible nexus between such material and the conclusion reached are indispensable safeguards against arbitrary exercise of power.
"Tested on the aforesaid touchstone, the impugned externment order falls short of the statutory requirement. Apart from recording that the conduct attributed to the appellant had generated resentment and public outrage amongst members of certain communities, the said order does not indicate the material on the basis of which such conclusion was reached," said the bench.
"The impugned externment order is infirm and indefensible and cannot be sustained for want of any cogent reasons in support thereof," it added.
The bench said no reasons are forthcoming to demonstrate why the third respondent considered the situation to be so grave as to necessitate the appellant’s externment.
"Furthermore, no material has been placed on record to show why the offences alleged require the appellant to be externed. More importantly, as noticed earlier, the appellant was neither served with notice nor afforded an opportunity to tender his explanation before the order came to be passed," noted the bench.
The externment order, purportedly, was passed in exercise of powers under clauses (a) and (b) of Section 5 of the Adhiniyam. The bench said the High Court grossly erred in not entertaining the appellant's writ petition.
Relegating the appellant to the statutory remedy under Section 9 of the Adhiniyam plainly demonstrated the High Court's abject failure to exercise its vested jurisdiction, it added.
"The impugned externment order, purportedly, was passed in exercise of powers under clauses (a) and (b) of Section 5 of the Adhiniyam. However, upon a plain reading of the said order and the statutory provision, we are of the considered view that invocation of Section 5(b) was wholly misconceived," said the bench.
The bench noted that non-compliance with Section 8 of the Adhiniyam renders the externment order ex facie illegal. The bench quashed the externment order passed after finding that it was vitiated by the failure to comply with the mandatory requirement of notice and hearing under Section 8 of the Chhattisgarh Rajya Suraksha Adhiniyam, 1990.
The case stemmed from multiple criminal proceedings against the appellant between 2009 and 2019, in which he was acquitted and cautioned by the District Magistrate to desist from unlawful activity.
Following two fresh FIRs—including one over a video allegedly containing abusive remarks against Satnami icon Baba Guru Ghasidas — the DM, acting on a police report, recalled its earlier order and passed an externment order without granting the appellant a hearing, barring him from Raigarh and adjoining districts for a year.
The Chhattisgarh High Court declined to entertain his writ petition, citing alternate remedies under the Adhiniyam, prompting him to move the Supreme Court.
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