Making it clear that preventive detention cannot be justified on stale allegations or incomplete material placed before the detaining authority, the Punjab and Haryana High Court has quashed a one-year detention order issued under the Prevention of Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (PITNDPS) Act.Allowing a writ petition seeking quashing of the detention order dated March 12, 2025, and the advisory board report dated May 28, 2025, Justice Suvir Sehgal held that the authorities had failed to establish a “live and proximate link” between the petitioner’s past conduct and the necessity of preventive detention.“Preventive detention is an extraordinary power and has to be exercised sparingly based on credible and proximate evidence of future criminal activities and not solely on the basis of past conduct or vague apprehension,” the court observed.Justice Sehgal added that the material relied upon by the detaining authority was not sufficient to sustain the detention.“This court is satisfied that the material relied upon by the detaining authority is not germane to arriving at a subjective satisfaction for passing of the impugned detention orders, which cannot be sustained.”The petitioner, Deepak Kumar aka Binni Gujjar, had approached the court against the state of Punjab through counsel Amit Agnihotri for quashing the detention orders and release from imprisonment.Justice Sehgal, during the hearing, examined the original record produced by the respondents before observing that the petitioner was named as an accused in 28 criminal cases under the Indian Penal Code and in four cases under the NDPS Act.Justice Sehgal, however, found that the authorities had failed to place before the detaining authority the crucial fact that the petitioner had already been acquitted in one of the four NDPS cases relied upon in the proposal for detention.“This development is not being disputed by the respondents and should have formed a part of the proposal, which was initiated on February 9, 2025, to detain the petitioner. It seems that the petitioner’s acquittal was not in the knowledge of the proposal initiating authority, nor was it brought to the notice of the competent authority, which passed the impugned orders. It stands established that a crucial fact regarding exoneration of the petitioner in one of the four NDPS cases has not been considered by the authorities,” Justice Sehgal asserted.Referring to Supreme Court precedent, the court added that the formation of the detaining authority’s subjective satisfaction stood vitiated if relevant material facts were withheld. Justice Sehgal added that the last NDPS case against the petitioner was registered in 2021.“The last criminal case registered against the petitioner would clearly qualify as stale material and cannot form the basis of detaining him,” the court observed.