Introduction:

The Dharwad Bench of the Karnataka High Court has reaffirmed an important principle governing the exercise of statutory power, holding that an executive notification cannot confer jurisdiction upon an authority that has not been authorised by the parent legislation. The Court declared a State Government notification purporting to confer powers under Sections 55 and 56 of the Karnataka Police Act, 1963 upon Superintendents of Police to be non-est and a nullity, observing that executive instructions cannot override or alter the express scheme of a statute.

The ruling was delivered by Justice Sachin Shankar Magadum in Chandrakant Shankar Vaddar v. State of Karnataka & Others, W.P. No. 104096 of 2026 (GM-Police). The writ petition arose from an externment order dated April 28, 2026, passed by the Superintendent of Police, Belagavi, against the petitioner. The petitioner challenged both the validity of the State Government notification dated November 18, 2025, and the consequential externment order issued pursuant to it.

The dispute centred on the statutory framework governing externment under the Karnataka Police Act, 1963. Sections 55 and 56 of the Act empower specified authorities to take preventive action against persons considered likely to commit certain offences or persons who have been convicted of specified offences. Externment is an extraordinary preventive measure because it restricts a person’s movement and requires the person to leave a particular territorial area. Consequently, the legislature has specifically identified the authorities competent to exercise such power and has prescribed the circumstances and manner in which the jurisdiction may be invoked.

Under the statutory scheme, the power under Sections 55 and 56 is vested in the Police Commissioner in Bangalore city and in other areas where a Commissioner of Police has been appointed. For areas outside the jurisdiction of a Police Commissioner, the statute contemplates exercise of the relevant power by the District Magistrate or Sub-Divisional Magistrate, subject to the statutory mechanism for extending the operation of the provision through notification published in the Official Gazette.

The State Government, however, issued a notification dated November 18, 2025, which purported, among other things, to confer the relevant powers upon Superintendents of Police. It was pursuant to this notification that the Superintendent of Police, Belagavi, passed the externment order against the petitioner.

The principal legal question before the High Court was therefore not whether the petitioner had actually engaged in conduct warranting externment. The more fundamental question was whether the Superintendent of Police possessed statutory jurisdiction to exercise the power in the first place.

The Court also examined a separate but closely connected defect in the notification. The State admitted that the notification dated November 18, 2025 had never been published in the Official Gazette. Since the statutory scheme expressly required Gazette publication for the relevant extension of authority, the absence of such publication itself raised a serious jurisdictional defect.

The High Court consequently considered whether an executive notification that had not been published in the Gazette could confer statutory authority upon an SP and, even if it had been properly published, whether the State Government could lawfully substitute a Superintendent of Police for the authorities expressly contemplated by Sections 55 and 56.

The Court answered both questions against the State. It held that the failure to publish the notification in the Official Gazette meant that the statutory requirement had not been fulfilled. More fundamentally, however, the Court held that Gazette publication could not cure the underlying defect because the legislature had not identified the Superintendent of Police as an authority competent to exercise the relevant externment powers.

The judgment therefore goes beyond the particular externment order. It reiterates the broader administrative-law principle that statutory power must be exercised by the authority designated by the legislature and in the manner prescribed by the statute. Administrative convenience or executive delegation cannot replace legislative authorisation.

Arguments of the Parties:

The petitioner challenged the State Government notification dated November 18, 2025 as being contrary to the Karnataka Police Act, 1963. The principal contention was that Sections 55 and 56 of the Act themselves identify the authorities competent to exercise externment powers and that a Superintendent of Police does not fall within those statutory categories.

The petitioner argued that the State Government could not, through an executive notification, enlarge the class of authorities empowered under the statute. The source of the power to order externment was the Karnataka Police Act itself, and therefore any exercise of that power had to conform strictly to the statutory framework.

According to the petitioner, the notification could not be treated as an independent source of power. An executive notification may facilitate implementation of a statute where the legislature has left an administrative gap, but it cannot amend the legislation by introducing a new authority to whom Parliament or the State Legislature had not entrusted the power.

The petitioner further relied on the fact that the notification had not been published in the Official Gazette. Since the statutory scheme contemplated publication of a notification in the Official Gazette for extending the operation of the relevant provision beyond the specified authorities and areas, the absence of publication meant that the notification had not acquired the legal force necessary to trigger the statutory consequence.

The petitioner therefore contended that the Superintendent of Police, Belagavi, lacked jurisdiction to pass the externment order dated April 28, 2026. Once the foundational notification was invalid, the consequential exercise of power by the SP was necessarily without jurisdiction.

The State, on the other hand, sought to sustain the notification and the action taken pursuant to it. The State’s position essentially proceeded from the administrative requirement of effectively exercising preventive policing powers. The notification had been issued by the Government with the apparent object of enabling police authorities to take appropriate preventive action in areas where the statutory mechanism otherwise placed the power in specified magistrates or police commissioners.

The State’s approach reflected an attempt to use executive authority to operationalise the preventive provisions of the Karnataka Police Act. From the State’s perspective, conferring the power upon Superintendents of Police could facilitate prompt action against persons considered a threat to public order or likely to commit offences.

However, the High Court was required to distinguish between administrative convenience and statutory competence. Even if the State considered it desirable for Superintendents of Police to exercise externment powers, the question remained whether the legislature had authorised the State Government to make such a substitution through an executive notification.

The State also admitted before the Court that the notification dated November 18, 2025 had not been published in the Official Gazette. This admission became significant because the statutory scheme expressly contemplated Gazette publication as a condition for extending the relevant provision.

The Court therefore considered the State’s position against the express wording of the parent legislation. It examined not merely whether the State Government intended to delegate power but whether the statute itself permitted the particular delegation and whether the procedural requirements attached to such delegation had been complied with.

The petitioner further relied upon settled Supreme Court jurisprudence concerning statutory powers. The principle emerging from those authorities is that where legislation identifies the authority competent to exercise a power and prescribes the manner in which that power must be exercised, the executive cannot substitute another authority merely through administrative action.

The petitioner placed reliance upon Sangeeta Suryavanshi v. State of Chhattisgarh (1991), in which the Supreme Court recognised that executive instructions or notifications cannot amend, supersede or operate contrary to the express provisions of the parent statute.

Reliance was also placed on State of U.P. v. Singhara Singh (1964) and Vijay Singh v. State of U.P. (2001). These decisions emphasise the principle that where a statute prescribes the manner in which a statutory power must be exercised and identifies the authority competent to exercise it, departure from that statutory prescription can render the resulting action invalid.

The arguments therefore placed before the High Court a fundamental question of administrative law: whether an executive authority can effectively rewrite the statutory allocation of power in the name of administrative implementation.

The High Court ultimately found that the answer had to be in the negative.

Court’s Judgment:

The Karnataka High Court allowed the writ petition and declared the State Government notification dated November 18, 2025 to be non-est and a nullity to the extent that it purported to appoint or confer powers upon Superintendents of Police to exercise powers under the Karnataka Police Act, 1963, including Sections 55 and 56. The Court also quashed the consequential externment order dated April 28, 2026 passed by the Superintendent of Police, Belagavi.

The judgment rests upon two independent grounds, both of which are significant. First, the notification had not been published in the Official Gazette despite the statutory requirement. Second, and more fundamentally, the Superintendent of Police was not an authority contemplated by Sections 55 and 56 and therefore could not acquire the relevant statutory jurisdiction through an executive notification.

The Court began with the principle that statutory power must be exercised in accordance with the statute that creates it. Where legislation identifies the authority, mode and manner of exercise of a particular power, those requirements are not optional administrative guidelines. They constitute the legal boundaries within which the power must operate.

Justice Sachin Shankar Magadum observed that an executive instruction, circular or notification cannot confer statutory power upon an authority that the parent statute itself does not recognise as competent to exercise that power. Executive instructions may supplement statutory provisions where there is an administrative gap, but they cannot override, amend or contradict the express provisions of the legislation.

This principle is particularly important in the context of externment. An externment order has serious consequences for individual liberty and freedom of movement. The person against whom such an order is made may be required to leave a particular geographical area and remain outside it for a specified period. Because of the coercive character of such power, the statutory conditions governing its exercise must be strictly respected.

The Court examined Sections 55 and 56 of the Karnataka Police Act in this context. The statutory scheme specifically identifies the authorities competent to exercise the relevant powers. In Bangalore city and other areas for which a Police Commissioner has been appointed, the power is entrusted to the Commissioner. For other areas, the statutory mechanism contemplates the District Magistrate or Sub-Divisional Magistrate, subject to the conditions prescribed by the Act.

The Superintendent of Police does not fall within these categories.

The Court therefore rejected any attempt to equate the office of Superintendent of Police with that of District Magistrate or Sub-Divisional Magistrate. Although an SP may exercise extensive policing and preventive powers under various laws, the existence of general police authority does not automatically confer every statutory power upon the officer.

The source of the power matters. A statutory power cannot be assumed merely because an officer performs functions that are broadly connected with the subject matter of that power. The legislature has the authority to determine which public authority may exercise a particular coercive power.

The High Court stated that the statutory authority identified by the legislature cannot be substituted by another authority through an executive act of delegation. This principle protects the legislative allocation of power and prevents administrative authorities from effectively amending legislation without legislative sanction.

The Court then considered the Gazette publication requirement. It noted that the State itself had admitted that the notification dated November 18, 2025 had never been published in the Official Gazette.

The consequence was clear. The statutory requirement concerning publication remained unfulfilled. Without publication in the manner required by the Act, the notification could not acquire the legal efficacy necessary to extend the statutory power.

The Court held that the absence of Gazette publication meant that the notification could not confer jurisdiction upon the Superintendent of Police to exercise powers under Sections 55 and 56. On this ground alone, the exercise of power by the SP would be without jurisdiction.

The Court, however, did not stop there. It considered whether publication of the notification in the Official Gazette at a later stage could cure the defect. The answer was again negative.

The High Court reasoned that Gazette publication is a procedural requirement for the exercise of the statutory power of extension; it does not create a power that the legislature has never conferred upon the proposed authority. Even if the notification were published properly, it could not transform a Superintendent of Police into a District Magistrate or Sub-Divisional Magistrate for purposes of Sections 55 and 56.

The Court therefore identified a distinction between a procedural defect and a substantive lack of jurisdiction. While compliance with publication requirements may be necessary to give effect to a valid statutory notification, publication cannot cure an inherent absence of statutory competence.

The Court’s reasoning was reinforced by the Supreme Court’s decision in Sangeeta Suryavanshi v. State of Chhattisgarh (1991). The principle emerging from that judgment is that executive instructions or notifications cannot amend or supersede the express provisions of a parent statute. The executive is bound by the legislative framework and cannot use administrative instruments to introduce changes that require legislative action.

The High Court also relied upon State of U.P. v. Singhara Singh (1964), where the Supreme Court dealt with the significance of statutory prescriptions concerning the manner of exercising a power. The broader principle is that where legislation prescribes a particular procedure or identifies the authority competent to act, compliance with the statutory prescription is essential.

Similarly, in Vijay Singh v. State of U.P. (2001), the Supreme Court reiterated the importance of statutory competence and procedure in the exercise of coercive powers. Where a power is entrusted to a specified authority, an unauthorised person cannot validly exercise it merely because that person is otherwise connected with the administration of the subject matter.

Applying these principles, the High Court concluded that the Superintendent of Police, Belagavi, had no jurisdiction to issue the externment order against the petitioner under Sections 55 and 56 of the Karnataka Police Act.

The Court’s conclusion did not depend upon an examination of whether the petitioner was otherwise a person against whom preventive action could have been taken. The substantive allegations against the petitioner could not cure the absence of jurisdiction. Even a potentially justified exercise of statutory power becomes legally unsustainable when undertaken by an authority lacking the statutory competence to exercise it.

This aspect of the judgment is fundamental to the rule of law. Public authorities do not possess inherent power merely because an action may appear desirable or necessary from an administrative perspective. Their jurisdiction must be traceable to law.

The Court therefore declared the notification dated November 18, 2025 non-est and a nullity insofar as it purported to confer powers upon Superintendents of Police under the Karnataka Police Act, including Sections 55 and 56.

The use of the expression “non-est” is significant. It indicates that, in the relevant respect, the notification could not be treated as a legally effective source of jurisdiction. Consequently, any action founded solely upon the purported authority created by that portion of the notification could not survive.

The externment order dated April 28, 2026 passed by the Belagavi Superintendent of Police was accordingly quashed.

The ruling also carries an important message concerning delegated and subordinate executive power. Delegated legislation is permissible where the parent statute authorises delegation and provides an appropriate framework. But administrative delegation cannot become a vehicle for rewriting the substantive allocation of statutory jurisdiction.

The executive may fill administrative gaps, but it cannot fill a legislative gap by inventing a power. Where the legislature has consciously selected particular authorities, the executive cannot replace those authorities simply because another officer may be considered better placed to perform the function.

The Court’s approach also protects individuals against arbitrary exercise of coercive state power. Externment affects a person’s ability to reside and move freely within a particular area. Such a restriction must therefore emanate from a legally competent authority acting within the precise boundaries of the enabling statute.

The judgment does not mean that Superintendents of Police are incapable of taking preventive action altogether. Rather, it establishes that the particular statutory power under Sections 55 and 56 cannot be exercised by an SP unless the legislature itself provides such authority through a valid statutory mechanism.

This distinction prevents the judgment from being misunderstood as limiting the general policing powers of Superintendents of Police. The ruling is concerned specifically with the source and scope of authority under the Karnataka Police Act.

The Court’s reasoning also reinforces the doctrine of separation of functions within the administrative structure. The legislature determines the legal power; the executive implements it; and the judiciary ensures that the executive remains within the limits prescribed by law. An executive notification cannot assume the role of legislation.

The decision is therefore an important reminder that administrative convenience cannot prevail over statutory command. Even where the Government believes that transferring a power to another officer would make enforcement more efficient, such a change must have a lawful statutory foundation.

The judgment further demonstrates why Gazette publication requirements cannot be treated as empty formalities. Where the legislature expressly requires a notification to be published in the Official Gazette, such publication forms part of the legal mechanism through which the delegated or extended power becomes operative. Failure to comply with that requireent can deprive the notification of legal efficacy.

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