Legal provisions regarding right to be produced before a Magistrate without delay under section 56 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973.
Section 56 of the Code of Criminal Procedure provides that a police officer making an arrest without warrant shall, without unnecessary delay and submit to the provisions herein contained as to bail, take or send the person arrested before a Magistrate having jurisdiction in the case, or before the officer in charge of a police station.
According to Section 76 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, the Police Officer or other person executing a warrant of arrest shall (subject to the provisions of Section 71 as to security) without unnecessary delay bring the person arrested before the Court before which he is required by law to produce such person. However, such delay shall not, in any case, exceed twenty-four hours exclusive of the time necessary, for the journey from the place of arrest to the Magistrate’s Court.
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ADVERTISEMENTS:
Whenever the question of “least possible delay” arises for decision in computing the period of time, the Court has to have regard to the particular circumstances of the case-physical impossibility or otherwise, to make over the arrested person to the nearest police station and how, where and in what circumstances, the arrest was effected.
What is meant by ‘unnecessary delay’ in Section 56 of the Code? The upper limit given is 24 hours—if this period is passed without compliance with this section, the arrested person should be released forthwith. And the lower limit may be, in some circumstance, less than 24 hours. If the two limits are not complied with, then there shall be ‘unnecessary delay’.