24-hour deadline to produce person before magistrate starts from detention, not ‘formal arrest’: SC
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The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that the 24-hour deadline to produce a detained person before a magistrate begins when they are taken into custody, not when the investigating agency formally records their arrest, Live Law reported.
Treating detention and “formal arrest” as separate events for the deadline is constitutionally unsustainable, held a bench of Justices Ujjal Bhuyan and Atul S Chandurkar.
“Any attempt to draw an artificial distinction between arrest and detention would dilute or negate the fundamental protection guaranteed by the Constitution,” Bar and Bench quoted the court as saying.
Article 22(2) of the Constitution requires that an arrested person be produced before the nearest magistrate within 24 hours of arrest, excluding the time needed to travel to the court.
On Thursday, the court also ruled that anyone detained for more than 24 hours without being produced before a magistrate must be released immediately.
The bench said that the magistrates must record the date and time when a person’s liberty was first curtailed and verify whether the 24-hour deadline has been observed.
They must also examine whether the detention was reasonable and can refuse further custody if it was excessive, even if the person was produced within 24 hours.
The court was hearing petitions filed by four persons against a Tripura High Court judgement that had denied them bail under...