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The article discusses Preventive Action by A Police Officer Under the Code of Criminal Procedure. The primary object of criminal procedure is to provide machinery for the administration of substantive criminal law. Therefore, the Code enacted elaborate preemptive measures to provide for any preventive action to be taken by a police officer to prevent the commission of a cognizable offence.
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Police has important role in the criminal justice process in India. The main objectives of the Police are to provide immediate help to the victim, to take preventive actions, to arrest the accused, to investigate fairly the crime, to enforce and to maintain law and order situation. The Police investigation is the back bone of the criminal justice process, we cannot expect to be fair justice without the fair and genuine investigation by Police. As an integral part of law enforcement agency, the Police have four basic responsibilities towards the public and the society in general, which are, enforcing laws, preventing crimes, responding to emergencies, and providing support services. But the Police have an important responsibility to investigate the crime fairly towards the criminal justice system. When it comes to the crime related to sexual offences against the women in India, the Police is more responsible to take action, prevention and fair investigation towards the justice to the victim of rape like heinous crime. Although the major components of criminal justice system are Police, Court and Correction Home or Jail, the investigation is the backbone of the fair and accurate justice delivered following the process of criminal justice system, but there are several questions raised on the investigation done by the Police authority by the kin of the accused and thereby an impartial investigating agency demanded for fair justice.^1 The article discusses Preventive Action by A Police Officer Under the Code of Criminal Procedure. The primary object of criminal procedure is to provide machinery for the administration of substantive criminal law. Therefore, the Code enacted elaborate pre- emptive measures to provide for any preventive action to be taken by a police officer to prevent the commission of a cognizable offence. These matters are contained in Sections 149 to 153 of the Code. For expedience, these provisions or the circumstances in which the power can be exercised in divided into three parts. (i) Prevention of cognizable offence (ii) Prevention of injury to public property, and (iii) Inspection of weights and measures. (^1) iPleaders. 2022. Preventive Action by the Police Under Code of Criminal Procedure - iPleaders. [online] Available at: <https://blog.ipleaders.in/preventive-action-police-code-criminal- procedure/#:~:text=According%20to%20Section%20151(1,the%20offence%20can't%20be]> [Accessed 12 April 2022].
Further, Section 150^3 provides that when an information with respect to an intention or design to commit an act which shall be a cognizable offence under the Code, is received by a police officer, such officer should transmit the information to his superior officer or any other officer whose duty is to prevent and take cognizance of such offences (usually, the officer in charge of a police station). The code vests power to arrest and investigate upon an officer of certain specific rank, for instance, Sub-inspector. However, it is possible that at the time when the information is received the officer in charge (Inspector or Sub-inspector, as the case may be) and all the sub-inspector of police are absent from the station house and the information may be recorded by an officer of a junior rank (such as a constable or Assistant Sub-inspector). Thus, since such officers have not been empowered to take action under the code, it is their duty to transmit information to the police officers to whom he is subordinate. Section 151 empowers a police officer “to make an arrest without orders from a Magistrate and without a warrant, the person designing the commission of a cognizable offence, if it appears to such officer that the commission of the offence cannot be otherwise prevented”. Thus, Section 151 empowers the police officers with similar powers as in the investigation of a cognizable case. For the application of Section 151, the following essentials or requirements must be proved:
so cannot, without more, be remanded to judicial custody and should be enlarged on bail treating the case as that of a bailable offence. The rules laid down in the code for arrest shall apply mutatis mutandis to arrest under this provision as well. Section 151 (2) provides that “no person arrested under Section 151 (1) shall be detained in custody for a period exceeding twenty- four hours from the time of his arrest unless his further detention is required or authorized under the provisions of the code”. This provision is in consonance with Section 57 of the code which provides for the procedure after arrest in general. The section has to be read with Sections 76 and 167 of the code. However, in a practical scenario, none of this is possible. Therefore, the role of Section 167 becomes significant. According to Section 167, if the police are unable to complete the investigation within the stipulated time of 24 hours, the Judicial Magistrate having jurisdiction of that area may extend the detention of the arrested person by 15 days and may, from time to time, increase it to effectuate effective investigation. In Shyam Dattaray, the court observed that the above rule shall also apply to arrest made under Section 151. Part II: Prevention of Injury to Public Property Section 152^5 states that “a police officer may of his own authority interpose to prevent any injury attempted to be committed in his view to any public property, movable or immovable or the removal or injury of any public landmark or buoy or other mark used for navigation”. This section is aimed at protecting any public property to be destroyed by acts of an individual. The term ‘public’ is defined under Section 12 of the Indian Penal Code, 1860as “public includes any class of the public or community but that class must be numerically sufficient to be designated as public”. The term community cannot mean the residents of a particular household but it has a wider implication than that. Further, “public property” connotes any property to which the public has access without any restriction or with permission of the competent authority. In Ram Kishore v. State[6], the court observed that public property also includes property belonging to the State camping grounds and grounds left unoccupied for sanitary or recreational purposes. (^5) The Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, § 152 , Acts of Parliament, 1973 (India)
Instances of misuse of preventive action The concept of preventive arrest is intelligible for the people who understand the law because they can comprehend the repercussions of lack of such preventive action laws. However, the laws are made for all the people of India which is a democratic country, and welfare is of utmost importance to the State. So, it is important for common people to believe in these prevention laws and not think of it as some tool to infringe fundamental rights. Medha Patkar V. State of M.P And Anr. on 25th September 2007^7 In this case, Medha Patkar vs the State of M.P. And Anr., In this certain positive landowners and other persons adversely affected the Sardar Sarovar Project gathered on the road for protesting. They shouted slogans which were about demanding land and other rehabilitation measures. The police had beaten up the protesters which included women and children also and arrested them under Section 151 of CrPC despite the fact that they raised no apprehension of committing a cognizable offence or disturbing public order or tranquillity. The Supreme Court directed the State of Madhya Pradesh to pay a compensation of Rs. 10,000 to the petitioner of this case and each male and female protestors who were arrested by the police in the evening of 25.7.2007 and after that, detained in Badwani and Indore Jails because their fundamental rights under Articles 19 and 21 of the Indian Constitution had been violated. (^7) Medha Patkar vs State Of M.P. And Anr. on 25 September, 2007
Police is an integral part of our general public and plays a crucial job in the criminal management of justice since police is essentially worried about the maintenance of the peace and harmony and requirement of the peace and security of the individual and the property of people. The police additionally need to stop the delinquency and atrocities against children and women. Despite the fact that the objectives of the police are honorable however they have been reprimanded and denounced for submitting acts which are simply opposite and this is on the grounds that the vested forces given to them to satisfy their social obligation are fit for being mishandled by them to stomp on the constitutional rights of the individuals in the public society. It likewise brings down the respect of the official and shakes the establishment of the trust and confidence imposed on them by the society. Generally, the Police has worked under the strictures of secrecy acquired from frontier times. This absence of transparency prompts doubt of corruption even where it is missing, making a Police force lacking certainty and reliability. There is right now a lot of acknowledgment of these weaknesses of the Police, especially regarding abuse of power and corruption. These are exceedingly significant headings the Police need to take in a democratic society. Undoubtedly, it is hard to perceive how a society can depict itself as a democratic just without democratic policing. In any case, to date such changes have stayed in the open discussion of discussion where there are numerous honest goals and minimal evident advancement. So, to deal with the due methodology.
