As reported on October 30, 2020, a three-judge bench held that confessional statements made to officers under Section 53, and recorded under Section 67 of the Narcotics Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (NDPS) Act (a penal law with punishments for small to commercial quantities of drugs, ranging from one year to 20 years, and fines of Rs 10,000 to 2 lakh) will not be admissible as evidence (Section 25 of the Evidence Act) to convict a suspect. The court held that officers vested with the power to investigate offences under the Act are ‘police officers’ and any confessional statement recorded by them will be barred by Section 25 of the Evidence Act. Thus, it will end the scope for misuse of the wide powers, given under the Act to extract confessions or frame suspects in drug-related crimes.
However, the third member of the bench, Justice Indira Banerjee, dissented with the majority and held that such a confession, given under NDPS Act, will be sufficient to convict a suspect. As per Section 53 of the NDPS Act, the Centre has the power to invest any officer of the Department of Central Excise, Narcotics, Customs, Revenue Intelligence or any other department of the central government, including paramilitary forces or armed forces, with the powers of an officer-in-charge of a police station for the investigation of offences.
The bench says that if the punishment is severe, the care should be greater, so that safeguards against misuse, may be preserved. The bench examined the questions with reference to the backdrop of Article 20(3), which protects a person against self-incrimination and Article 21, which includes right to life, liberty, and privacy.
As per the majority, the interpretation of a statute like the NDPS Act must be in conformity with the spirit of the broad fundamental right, not to incriminate oneself, and the right to privacy, found in the recent judgements of this court.
As per Section 30 of the draconian Act, preparation to commit an offence is made an offence and Section 31A provides for the death penalty for subsequent offence in specific cases. Moreover, if an accused conducts himself well in jail, he cannot have the benefit of remission or commutation as the Probation of Offenders Act, 1958 does not apply to convicts above 18 years.
The central government argued that officers under the NDPS Act cannot be called police officers, however, the bench viewed that any officer, invested with the power of investigation, is a police officer as they prevent and detect crime, extort confessions, and are able to achieve their object through a shortcut method of extracting involuntary confessions.
The court said that if a case of confiscation of drugs is investigated by the police of a state and the same offence is probed by an officer under NDPS Act, how can it be possible that one investigation enjoys safeguards of a police investigation under Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) while another is free of them. If there is a statute to give rise to such anomalies, it must be struck down under Article 14 of the Constitution.
Courtesy: HindustanTimes