Learned counsel for the plaintiff urged us to depart from the reasonableness test as propounded by this Court in Sivarasa Rasiah on two grounds namely: (i) In Sivarasa Rasiah, this Court for some reason did not consider the earlier decision of the Supreme Court in the case of Pung Chen Choon where it was specifically held that the “reasonableness test” ought not to apply to restrictions imposed pursuant to Art. 10; and (ii) The framers of the Constitution had deliberately omitted the word “reasonable” from the final draft of Art. 10(2). This is to be contrasted with Art.19 (2) of the Indian Constitution which stipulates that such law may only impose reasonable restriction. This distinction was expressly acknowledged by the Supreme Court in Pung Chen Choon. [35] Having regard to the legislative history of Art.10(2), it would appear that in the initial draft the “restriction” was to be qualified by the word “reasonable”, as in the case of Art.19(2) of the Indian Constitution. The word was however omitted from the final draft by the Working Committee, adopting the dissenting opinion of Justice Abdul Hamid of Pakistan, a member of the Reid Commission. For those reasons, we are inclined to agree with the view of the Supreme Court in Pung Chen Choon, that it is not for the Court to determine whether the restriction imposed by the legislature pursuant to Art.10(2) is reasonable or otherwise. That, in our opinion, is a matter strictly within the discretion of the legislature and not within the purview of the court. Similarly, we are of the view that the reasoning in Ooi Ah Phua v Officer in Charge Criminal Investigation Kedah/Perlis [1975] 2 MLJ 198 does not justify the insertion of the word “reasonable” before the word “restriction” in Art. 10(2). In Ooi Ah Phua, the Federal Court was concerned with the interpretation of Art. 5(3), which reads: “Where a person is arrested he shall be informed as soon as may be of the grounds of his arrest and shall be allowed to consult and be defended by a legal practitioner of his choice” [36] – [37] Suffian LP construed that provision in the following words: “With respect I agree that the right of an arrested person to consult his lawyer begins from the moment of arrest, but I am of the opinion that that right cannot be exercised immediately after arrest. A balance has to be struck between the right of the arrested person to consult his lawyer on the one hand and on the other the duty of the police to protect the public from wrongdoers by apprehending them and collecting whatever evidence exists against 8