Kochi : Kerala High Court has held that while the 24-hour production mandate is absolute following an arrest, pre-arrest detention is permissible under certain statutory provisions that expressly authorise it, including certain provisions of the NDPS Act and PMLA, as well as provisions of the BNSS mandating notice for appearance.
It further directed the HC registry to transmit a copy of the order to the state police chief and all criminal courts in Kerala for due compliance.
The court also stated that whether there has been illegal detention before the formal recording of arrest must be carefully assessed in the light of the circumstances of each case.
The judgment came over a batch of bail applications filed by accused in various criminal cases, including NDPS cases, who sought bail on the ground that they had been detained for more than 24 hours before being produced before a magistrate. They further claimed that their illegal detention violated a previous decision of the HC in the Biswajit Mandal case, which held that the 24-hour period begins not from the formal arrest but from the point when the accused was effectively detained or their liberty curtailed. In such cases, the 24-hour period begins only upon formal arrest. An arrested person must be produced before a magistrate within 24 hours of detention, excluding only travel time. Similarly, if the investigation cannot be completed within 24 hours, the case records must be transmitted to the magistrate along with the accused.
The prosecution, however, contended that the principle laid down in the Biswajit Mandal case cannot be extended to every instance of pre-arrest detention, as detention in custody without arrest is permissible under law in certain circumstances. In all other circumstances, any deprivation of liberty before arrest must be treated as part of the detention period, and the statutory timeline for judicial oversight is triggered at that point, the court clarified. of which one was allowed and the other five dismissed, the court also issued guidelines to ensure effective enforcement of constitutional and statutory safeguards in cases involving arrest While deciding the bail petitions. These include a directive to investigating agencies to record the precise time of initial detention or apprehension, in addition to the time of formal arrest. Magistrates must verify compliance with constitutional and statutory safeguards and state explicitly in remand orders whether there has been compliance.