How two recent Bombay High Court judgments combined understanding of criminal law with constitutional law

Violation of constitutional safeguards regarding detention by police is not given much importance at the trial court-level. In that context, two recent judgments of the Bombay High Court could be a guiding torch for lower courts to realize their powers.

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TWO judgments of great significance delivered by the Bombay High Court in the last three years indicate a trend of understanding the Code of Criminal Procedure ('CrPC') as per the Constitutional framework of "due process of law" in Article 21 of the Constitution. This is a welcome trend, since the right to life is one of the most precious of all rights guaranteed by the Constitution, which ought to inform the interpretation of all laws in India.

In Vachhalabai versus The State of Maharashtra & Ors. (2019), the Aurangabad bench of the high court dealt with the issue of how the expression "nearest magistrate" is to be interpreted and its significance qua Article 22.

The Goa bench of the Bombay High Court recently had an occasion to consider the peculiar issue of the consequences of violation of fundamental rights of a detenue guaranteed under Articles 21 and 22 of the Constitution, in Ugochukwu Solomon Ubabuko versus Union of India (2021). Valuing the right to be produced before the nearest magistrate "within 24 hours" of captivity, Hon'ble Justice Manish Pitale, in his judgmenthas held that violation of such a precious right would entitle the detenue to bail.

Ugochukwu Solomon Ubabuko

The case pertained to a foreign national, arrested under the stringent Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985. Interestingly, this happened to be his fifth brush with substance abuse law, while he was on bail on the earlier four. Yet, this did not affect the outcome of the case before the court, and rightly so.