In a move towards curbing harassment in cases of police enquiry, the Madras High Court has issued a set of guidelines and also ordered that the police must summon any person named in the complaint or any witness to the incident complained of through a written summons under Section 179 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, and the minutes of the enquiry should be recorded in the general diary.

The petitioner approached the High Court by filing a Criminal Original Petition filed under Section 528 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita,seeking a direction to the police to not harass the petitioner in the guise of enquiry on the basis of the representation.

The Single Bench of Justice G.K. Ilanthiraiyan noted, “Though the Sanhita empowers the Magistrate to be a guardian in all the stages of the police investigation, there is no power envisaging him to interfere with the actual investigation or the mode of investigation. It is in this background that numerous petitions complaining of harassment are being reported and filed before this Court seeking for directions to refrain the police officials from harassing the persons named in a complaint.”

“While summoning any person named in the complaint or any witness to the incident complained of, the police officer shall summon such person through a written summon under Section 179 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, specifying a particular date and time for appearing before them for such an enquiry/investigation”, it ordered.

Advocate G. Mageshkumar represented the Petitioner while Additional Public Prosecutor A. Amarnath represented the Respondent.

Arguments

It was the case of the petitioner that the respondent police harassed the petitioners under the guise of enquiry.

The respondent police submitted that, on the complaint given by the de facto complainant against the petitioners, the petition enquiry was pending on the file of the police.

Reasoning

The Bench explained that an enquiry into a non-cognizable offence or a cognizable offence is within the unfettered powers of the Investigation Officers, so long as the power to investigate/enquiry into these offences are legitimately exercised within the framework of Chapter XIII of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023.

Thus, to address such situations as raised in the petition, the Bench issued the following guidelines:

  • While summoning any person named in the complaint or any witness to the incident complained of, the police officer shall summon such person through a written summon under Section 179 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, specifying a particular date and time for appearing before them for such an enquiry/investigation.
  • The minutes of the enquiry shall be recorded in the general diary/station diary/daily diary of the police station.
  • The police officer shall refrain himself or herself from harassing persons called upon for enquiry/investigation.
  • The guidelines stipulated for preliminary enquiry or registration of FIR by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in Lalita Kumari Vs. Government of Uttar Pradesh and others [2014 (2) SCC (1)] shall be strictly adhered to.

Cause Title: Varadhan v. State (Case No.: CRL OP No. 15130 of 2026)

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Madras HCJustice G K Ilanthiraiyan

Tulip Kanth

Assistant Editor

Tulip Kanth is an Assistant Editor at Verdictum having over 5 years of experience in the field of legal journalism and editing. She extensively covers judgments of the Supreme Court, High Courts as well as Tribunals. She has previously worked with a legal publishing website where she oversaw the work of other editors and has also created updates on notifications of different Government Ministries. She holds an English Honours Degree from SGTB Khalsa College, Delhi University and has completed her LLB course with specialisation in Corporate Law from Amity University.