Human rights organisation People’s Union for Civil Liberties on Friday urged the National Democratic Alliance government at the Centre to amend a section of the recently implemented Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, to clarify the maximum period of police custody allowed under the law.

The new law, which replaced the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, came into effect on Monday. Legal and civil rights activists had expressed concerns that it may allow the police to request custody of a person accused of a crime for as many as 60 to 90 days after their arrest, in addition to the initial 15-day period of remand, reported The Hindu on Sunday.

Union Minister of Home Affairs Amit Shah clarified in a press conference that the maximum period of police custody under the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita would remain 15 days, with a provision to be extended up to a maximum of two months, reported The Indian Express.

“Earlier, if an accused was sent to police remand and he got himself admitted in a hospital for 15 days, there was no interrogation as his remand period would expire,” Shah had said.

The People’s Union for Civil Liberties, however, pointed out that while Shah’s clarification is welcome, it is not sufficient as it does not have the force of law.

In a letter to Shah and Minister for Law and Justice Arjun Meghwal on Friday, the group said: “It will be apposite if the clarification is brought about in the provision of section 187 (3) BNSS through an amendment to section 187 BNSS, so that it is not left to the vagaries of interpretation by courts, the police and the public prosecutors, in the immediate future.”

The group added that the controversy regarding the provision of police custody had come about as Section 187 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita “was literally a verbatim copy of the previous Section 167 CrPC, with the omission of eight words, which gave a totally different interpretation to the new provision on police remand”.

The organisation pointed out that the Code of Criminal Procedure had said: “The Magistrate may authorise the detention of the accused person, otherwise than in the custody of the police, beyond the period of fifteen days, if he is satisfied that adequate grounds exist for doing so.”

However, the phrase “otherwise than in the custody of the police” is missing from the new law. The People’s Union for Civil Liberties said that this “allows for the interpretation that police custody can be extended from a maximum of 15 days to 60/90 days”.

“Any extension of police custody beyond 15 days is a serious incursion in the rule of law and the criminal justice system,” the group said. “It is well recognised that the period when the accused is kept directly in the custody of the police is the time when maximum pressure from the police is effected, including the reality of the police using extrajudicial measures like physical torture, emotional pressures and other similar measures to break the will of the arrested persons.”

The group also said that legal interpretation of the law will be based solely on the words and terms used in the section.

“As pointed out, the courts are bound to consider the fact that the Parliament has consciously omitted the eight words ‘ …otherwise than in police custody’, and therefore interpret that Parliament intended to expand police custody from maximum of 15 days to 60/90 days,” it said.

In view of this, the organisation urged the government to bring an amendment to the new law “which will make it explicitly clear that the police custody can be only for a maximum of 15 days”.

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