New Delhi: Less than half an hour after three new criminal laws came into effect on 1 July, the Madhya Pradesh Police filed the first FIR under these laws at Hazira Police Station under Gwalior district. The FIR was registered at 12.24 am on 1 July on the complaint of one Saurabh Nrwaria who reported the alleged alleged theft of his Yamaha two-wheeler minutes after midnight.
In Delhi, around 90 minutes post midnight, the Delhi Police booked a street vendor from Bihar for obstructing the public on a road and selling tobacco products in its FIR under The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023. The BNS has replaced the Indian Penal Code.
The Delhi FIR, filed at the Kamla Nagar Police Station, a copy of which ThePrint has seen, was registered under section 285 (danger or obstruction in a public way or line of navigation), based on a complaint from a head constable patrolling near New Delhi Railway Station who allegedly found the vendor named Pankaj Kumar from Bihar’s Patna obstructing the public. If proven guilty, the accused, under section 285 of the BNS, is liable to be punished with a fine of Rs 5,000.
The FIR itself was registered under section 173 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, departing from the erstwhile Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, under which FIRs were filed under section 174.
President Droupadi Murmu gave her assent to the three new laws — the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, and the Bharatiya Sakshya Act — in December last year. Starting today, the Indian Penal Code, the Code of Criminal Procedure, and the Indian Evidence Act cease to be effective.
These laws have been a bone of contention between the government and Opposition parties, with senior Opposition leaders such as the former home minister P. Chidambaram calling them more draconian, which could come as an instrument of oppression against the poor, working and weaker sections of the society.
These laws were passed during the winter session of parliament last year. Home Minister Amit Shah had said that the focus of these new laws was justice, not punishment. They have been designed with technological development in mind.
He also tried to dismiss the criticism of opposition parties, which had called the new laws a step towards a police state, saying that as long as his government is in power, India cannot be a police state.
This is an updated version of the report.
(Edited by Zinnia Ray Chaudhuri)
Also read: It’s back to the classroom for Delhi police officers to learn new criminal laws, unlearn IPC, CrPC