4 min readLucknowUpdated: Sep 14, 2026 10:12 AM IST
Observing that “the State is persistent in its approach of using the Goonda Act as a tool of oppression”, the Allahabad High Court has quashed an order issued by the Gonda district magistrate externing a man from the district limits for six months.
The petitioner, Zahid Ali, had challenged the DM’s May order invoking the Uttar Pradesh Control of Goondas Act against him, which was later endorsed by the Devipatan divisional commissioner.
The order had cited a police report which stated that Ali was a habitual offender with two criminal cases against him.
In his appeal before the appellate authority — the divisional commissioner — Ali said he had already been acquitted in one of the criminal cases cited by police.
Hearing the petition, a single bench of Justice Subhash Vidyarthi in Thursday’s order observed, “Although the courts have repetitively held that the Goonda Act is a powerful tool for the control and suppression of the ‘Goondas’: that it should be used very sparingly in very clear cases of ‘public disorder’ or for the maintenance of ‘public order’.”
The bench added, “…It should not be allowed to be misused as a tool of oppression of innocent persons and that the Goonda Act is not intended to secure punishment of a person without his conviction for a substantial offence, numerous cases are being presented before this Court, indicating that the State is persistent in its approach of using the Goonda Act as a tool of oppression, and the present case is a glaring example of the abuse of the aforesaid statute.”
In his order, the DM had stated that the Gonda superintendent of police (SP) had submitted a report stating “the petitioner was a person of criminal nature and is involved in two criminal cases”.
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In one case, lodged in the district in 2010, he was chargesheeted by police for allegedly barging into a shop along with his accomplices and assaulting, abusing and threatening the shopkeeper, it was stated. In another case, Ali faced charges of attacking and injuring a person and was also accused of violating norms during the COVID pandemic, the order stated. The order also cited a report by police over Ali’s behaviour and his failure to reply to the show-cause notice issued to him.
The orders said his involvement in two criminal cases in which chargesheets were filed made a case for declaring him a “goonda”.
The petitioner, through his counsel, submitted in the court that he had challenged the DM’s order before the divisional commissioner and that he was acquitted in the 2010 case in August 2017, by the Gonda chief judicial magistrate. A copy of the judgment was submitted as evidence, and that the pending 2020 case was lodged due to political reasons, he contended.
The HC bench said even as the petitioner had produced a copy of the acquittal order, the externment order still cited the two cases and a beat information report pending against him.
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This indicated that “the commissioner has not applied her mind while deciding the appeal”, it said. “The appellate order suffering from the vice of non-application of mind becomes unsustainable in law,” it added.
This indicated that the police had “deliberately portrayed a false picture of the petitioner” before the district magistrate, the court also observed.
