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Synopsis

The Delhi High Court, recently, opined that the requirement under Section 50 of the Cr.P.C. to provide the grounds of arrest without delay means that the investigating must serve the grounds of arrest to the arrestee simultaneously with the issuance of the arrest memo or as an integral part of it.

The bench of Justice Anup Jairam Bhambhani held, “The sequitur to the aforesaid observations of the Supreme Court is, that since grounds of arrest must exist before an arrest is made; and there must be a contemporaneous record of the grounds of arrest in the police diary or other document, there can possibly be no reason or justification for an investigating officer/arresting officer to not communicate to an arrestee the grounds of arrest in writing”. 

The petitioner faced allegations of assisting an Afghan national in emigrating to Spain using fraudulently obtained Indian identity documents, including a passport, Aadhaar card, and PAN card, in exchange for money. The petitioner was summoned under Section 41-A Cr.P.C. but initially failed to appear. He later complied with a notice on March 20, 2024 and was arrested after interrogation. The court granted him bail on March 21, 2024, which was later made absolute on March 28, 2024. The State challenged these orders, and on June ,6 2024, the Sessions Court allowed the revision petition, canceling the petitioner’s bail.

Senior Advocate Rebecca M. John, representing the petitioner, raised four main arguments. First, she contended that the State’s revision petition was not maintainable because orders denying police custody were interlocutory and thus not subject to revision under Section 397(2) Cr.P.C. Second, she argued that the notice under Section 41-A Cr.P.C. had been improperly served, rendering the petitioner’s arrest unlawful. Third, she asserted that the petitioner was not provided written grounds for arrest, in violation of Supreme Court precedents. Fourth, she maintained that the petitioner had not been presented before a Magistrate within 24 hours, contravening Section 57 Cr.P.C. Therefore, she argued that the Sessions Court’s order reversing the Magistrates’ rulings was legally flawed and should be set aside.

Additional Solicitor General Sanjay Jain, for the State, refuted these claims. Citing Supreme Court Judgments, it was asserted that an investigating officer could arrest a person under Section 41(1)(b) Cr.P.C. if the offense was punishable with more than seven years, regardless of prior notice under Section 41-A Cr.P.C. He concluded that the petitioner was arrested at 11:30 p.m. and produced before the Magistrate within the mandated period.

The court considered four key contentions. Firstly, the court examined whether the revision petition against the orders dated March 21 and 28, 2024 was maintainable. Relying on precedents such as Usmanbhai Dawoodbhai Memon v State of Gujarat [(1988) 2 SCC 271] and State v N.M.T. Joy Immaculate [(2004) 5 SCC 729], the court distinguished between interlocutory and final orders. It concluded that since the Magistrate and ACMM had declined police custody remand, these were not interlocutory orders. As such, they were subject to revision under Section 397 Cr.P.C., making the petition maintainable.

“The legal logic of holding that an order granting police custody remand is an interlocutory order is easy to decipher, viz. that police custody remand cannot, by the very nature of such order, be final or dispositive of any rights and is a temporary order, which is why the Supreme Court held that such an order is an interlocutory order”, the court held. 

Secondly, the court analyzed whether the Section 41-A Cr.P.C. notice issued on March 19, 2024 complied with judicial guidelines from Amandeep Singh Johar v State [2018 SCC OnLine Del 13448] and Satender Kumar Antil v CBI [(2022) 10 SCC 51]. The State failed to provide any receipted copy of the notice or proof of its service from an indexed, serialized booklet. The court inferred that the notice had not been duly served, rendering it non-compliant with legal mandates.

“At the risk of repetition, an order granting police custody remand can never be a final order, since police custody would always be granted for a certain defined period of time, which may be subject to extension”, the court observed. 

The court further added, “An order granting police custody remand is therefore an interlocutory order; but an order declining police custody remand is not”. 

Thirdly, the court considered whether the petitioner was under arrest upon reaching the police station at 2:00 p.m. on March 20, 2024. It held that mere presence at a police station did not automatically constitute arrest and left the question open for determination in an appropriate case.

The court opined, “merely arriving at a police station may not imply that a person is automatically under arrest; and this question would depend on the facts of a given case, viz. whether a person was placed under restraint of liberty while in the police station and, if so, at what stage and from what time”. 

Lastly, the court examined whether the petitioner received the grounds of arrest in writing as required by Prabir Purkayastha [(2024) 8 SCC 254] v State and Pankaj Bansal v Union [(2024) 7 SCC 576]. It noted that the investigating officer failed to provide any document containing the grounds at the time of arrest. The remand application also lacked such details. 

Citing Marfing Tamang v State [2025 SCC OnLine Del 548], the court emphasized that grounds of arrest must be provided simultaneously with the arrest memo and cannot be served merely before a remand hearing. This failure rendered the arrest legally defective.

As a result, the court set aside the Sessions Court’s order dated June 6, 2024 and restored the ACMM’s order dated March 03, 2024, thereby allowing the petitioner to remain on bail. The petition was accordingly disposed of, along with any pending applications.

For Petitioner: Senior Advocates Rebecca M. John with Vishal Gosain, Arun Khatri, Sahil Khurana, Pravir Singh and Anushka Barua
For Respondent: Additional Solicitor General Sanjay Jain, Additional Public Prosecutor Aman Usman and Additional Standing Counsel Sanjeev Bhandari with Advocates Akhand Pratap Singh, Nishank Tripathi, Nishant Tripathi, Harshita Sukhija, Samriddhi, Palak Jain, Arjit Sharma, Nikunj Bindal and Charu Sharma
Case Title: Vikas Chawla v State (2025:DHC:2040)