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Sonam Wangchuk was instigating people in border area: Govt to SC

On Monday, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre and the Ladakh administration, had referred to some of Wangchuk’s speeches.

3 min readUpdated: Feb 3, 2026 10:48 PM IST

Mehta said that Wangchuk had also spoken about his connection in the Magsaysay and Nobel Prize committees and said he can even get to deny someone the prize. (File Photo)

The Centre and Ladakh administration submitted before the Supreme Court on Tuesday that there was “scrupulous compliance” of procedure while detaining activist Sonam Wangchuk under the National Security Act (NSA), 1980, and that he was “instigating people” in a border area.

On Monday, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the Centre and the Ladakh administration, had referred to some of Wangchuk’s speeches and told a bench of Justices Aravind Kumar and P B Varale that Wangchuk wished to see a situation similar to what happened in Nepal and Bangladesh in the Union Territory too.

The bench is hearing a petition filed by Wangchuk’s wife Gitanjali J Angmo challenging his detention.

Resuming his submissions on Tuesday, Mehta again referred to Wangchuk’s speeches. Wangchuk, he pointed out, said, “‘it is unacceptable that Ladakhi’s cannot make their own laws or choose their own representatives despite once being a free kingdom’.” The SG said, “This is slightly objectionable because it (Ladakh) is an integral part of India and everyone accepts this but he repeatedly says it was a free kingdom.”

Quoting Wangchuk, Mehta said, “‘Even Skardu in Pakistan has its own Assembly and chief minister. In China, Tibet and five other regions have autonomous rights, sometimes even more than ordinary provinces. Even in Tibet there is an Assembly called Tibet Autonomous Region People’s Congress (TARPC) who makes decisions. If Pakistan and China can grant these rights, how can a democratic India deny them to Ladakh.”

“If a Chinese national argues this, I can understand that,” the SG said. “Your Lordships are dealing with a person who is instigating people in an area which is a border area, bordering both Pakistan and China and there are certain region-specific sensitivities involved.”

Mehta said that Wangchuk had also spoken about his connection in the Magsaysay and Nobel Prize committees and said he can even get to deny someone the prize.

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Justice Kumar asked, “So according to you all these talks would constitute a threat to the country?”

“Threat to the country and public order,” said Mehta.

The SG added that his detention was not punishment for what he had said, but rather a measure to prevent it from being repeated. The SG added that one of the arguments raised by Wangchuk was that he was taken to Rajasthan.

“The answer is in section 5 of the NSA,” he said.

Section 5 deals with the “power to regulate place and conditions of detention”.

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Section 5 deals with the “power to regulate place and conditions of detention”. It said that “every person in respect of whom a detention order has been made shall be liable—(a) to be detained in such place and under such conditions, including conditions as to maintenance, discipline and punishment for breaches of discipline, as the appropriate Government may, by general or special order, specify; and (b) to be removed from one place of detention to another place of detention, whether within the same State or in another State, by order of the appropriate Government”.

“There is an order of the appropriate government that he will be detained in a Rajasthan centre,” Mehta said.