Mother Of Accused In Anna University Sexual Abuse Case Moves Madras High Court Challenging His Detention Under Goondas Act

The bench of Justice MS Ramesh and Justice N Senthilkumar has sought a response to the plea by Gengadevi, Gnanasekar's mother.

Gnanasejar was accused of sexually assaulting a 2nd year engineering student at the Anna University campus in Chennai in December 2024. The High Court had constituted a Special Investigation Team to investigate the incident after finding faults in the state police's investigation.

By an order of the Commissioner of Police on January 5, 2025, Gnanasekar was detained stating that his activities were prejudicial to the maintenance of public peace and public order. He was termed as a “sexual offender” and detained in the Central Prison, Chennai.

Gengadevi, in her plea, stated that the detention order was a misuse of power and passed with a malafide intention. It was submitted that Gnanasekar had not indulged in any illegal activities and never acted in a manner prejudicial to the maintenance of public peace, tranquility, and public order. She submitted that the detaining authority had no material to show that Gnanasekar was a habitual offender for detaining him. She submitted that the detaining authority has no power to pass the order under Section 3(1) of the Act and exceeded its jurisdiction while passing the detention order against Gnanasekar.

It was submitted that the detaining authority failed to consider that there was no proximate or live connection between the acts complained of and the date of detention. She pointed out that the two adverse cases related to the year 2019 and were very old cases while the third case was purposely created with an intention to detain him in jail. Thus, she submitted that the detention order was passed in violation of the Fundamental Rights guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution.

It was further submitted that the order was passed mechanically and there was an unjustified exercise of power to wreck vengeance which was a serious misuse of power. She added that the detaining authority had not perused all material documents and the Sponsoring Authority had not placed all materials and vital documents before the detaining for subjective satisfaction. Thus, she called for quashing the detention order for being illegal and improper.

Case Title: Gengadevi v. The Secretary To The Government And Others

Case No: HCP No. 382 of 2025