The Orissa High Court has directed the state police and the home department to introduce strict training programmes to ensure that every person taken into custody is provided written grounds of arrest, calling the requirement a constitutional safeguard that cannot be ignored.
The direction came from Justice Gourishankar Satapathy while hearing a bail application filed by three accused in a July 2025 bank robbery case in Nayagarh. The court flagged repeated violations of Article 22(1) of the Constitution and Section 47 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, observing that failure to communicate the grounds of arrest in writing undermines the legality of the detention.
Highlighting the consequences of such lapses, the court said that non-compliance with the mandate to furnish written grounds of arrest could make the arrest itself illegal. In such situations, the accused would become entitled to bail as a matter of right.
Justice Satapathy placed responsibility on the Director General of Police and the principal secretary of the home department to oversee the training of police personnel. The court said the training must ensure strict adherence to constitutional and statutory requirements during arrests so that procedural violations do not weaken criminal prosecutions.
The order underscores the court’s concern that failure to follow arrest procedures not only infringes fundamental rights but also jeopardises the sustainability of the case against the accused.
