The story so far:
This principle was reiterated by the court in Prabir Purkayastha v. It held that communicating the grounds of arrest was not merely a procedural formality but a vital safeguard with the ultimate objective of enabling the arrested person to effectively consult legal aid and be prepared to raise objections in the remand hearing and apply for his/her bail. However, in Vihaan Kumar v.
The genesis of informing the grounds of arrest to a person flows from the Constitutional safeguard provided in Article 21 that no person shall be deprived of his life and personal liberty except according to procedure established by law. Article 22(2) says that every person who is arrested and detained in custody shall be produced before the nearest magistrate within a period of 24 hours of such arrest, excluding the time necessary for the journey from the place of arrest to the court of the magistrate, and no such person shall be detained in custody beyond the said period without the authority of a magistrate. The Constitutional safeguard is incorporated in Section 50 of the CrPC (now Section 47 of BNSS). Section 47 of BNSS casts a duty on the police officer to communicate the grounds of arrest to an accused person arrested without a warrant. However, neither Article 22(2) of the Constitution nor Section 47 of BNSS specifies the mode of communicating the grounds of arrest to an accused person. State (NCT of Delhi) (May 2024) while dealing with a case under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967. Also, any breach of Article 22(2) would vitiate the lawfulness of arrest and subsequent remand, and entitle the person to be set at liberty. State of Haryana and Another (2025), the court observed that although the ideal mode of communication of grounds of arrest is to provide such grounds in writing, there is no such statutory requirement to do so.
The Supreme Court recently, in Jaskaran Jeet Singh Deol v. It also recommended departmental action for the negligent investigating officer (IO) and change of the IO in the case. State of Punjab (September 2026), held that the investigating agency would require permission of the magistrate to re-arrest the accused after his previous arrest was held illegal for the non-supply of the grounds of arrest in writing.
Union of India & Ors. (2023), the Supreme Court while dealing with a case of Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA) held that there was no valid reason as to why a written copy of the grounds of arrest could not be provided to the arrestee as a standard procedure without any exception. In Pankaj Bansal v. The court cited two reasons for it. First, in case the grounds of arrest are orally read out to an accused person, those orally stated facts could be disputed in a given case. Second, the accused person may seek legal counsel to avail bail.
The court therefore held that furnishing a copy of written grounds of arrest to an accused was mandatory without exception.
The court in the Jaskaran Jeet Singh Deol (supra) case said that in case the IO still needs to re-arrest an accused for custodial interrogation during investigation, the IO has to file an application before the concerned magistrate for custody, stating the reasons.
