Article 22 Is Not an Empty Formality: Failure to Furnish Written Grounds of Arrest Can Override the NDPS Bail Embargo, Holds Punjab and Haryana High Court

Case Name: Amritpal Kaur @ Amrit Kaur v. State of Punjab

Date of Judgment: 22 July 2026

Citation: CRM-M-7299-2026

Bench: Hon’ble Mr. Justice Virinder Aggarwal

Held: The Punjab and Haryana High Court held that the constitutional mandate under Article 22(1) requiring communication of the grounds of arrest in writing is a mandatory safeguard that cannot be diluted even in prosecutions under the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985. The Court observed that an arrest memo is legally distinct from the written grounds of arrest, and failure to furnish such grounds to both the arrestee and the nominated relative renders the arrest prima facie constitutionally infirm.

The Court further held that where there is prima facie non-compliance with the constitutional and statutory safeguards governing arrest, coupled with absence of recovery from the accused, prolonged pre-trial incarceration and other mitigating circumstances, the rigours of Section 37 of the NDPS Act cannot justify continued deprivation of personal liberty.

Summary: The petitioner sought regular bail in a case registered under Sections 21(c), 27-A and 29 of the NDPS Act, the Aircraft Act, 1934 and the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, arising out of the alleged recovery of more than ten kilograms of heroin purportedly dropped by a drone from across the international border.

The prosecution alleged that several accused persons were apprehended with commercial quantities of heroin, while the petitioner, who was not named in the FIR, was subsequently implicated during investigation solely on the basis of disclosure statements made by co-accused persons. According to the prosecution, her alleged role was limited to transferring ₹40,000 to a co-accused at the instance of her husband, who was residing abroad.

The petitioner contended that no contraband had been recovered from her possession and that there was no independent evidence connecting her with financing illicit trafficking under Section 27-A of the NDPS Act. More significantly, it was argued that the investigating agency had failed to communicate the written grounds of arrest either to her or to her nominated relative, thereby violating the mandatory constitutional guarantee under Article 22(1) of the Constitution and Section 52(1) of the NDPS Act.

Justice Virinder Aggarwal undertook an extensive examination of the constitutional jurisprudence governing arrest safeguards. Relying upon Prabir Purkayastha v. State (NCT of Delhi), Vihaan Kumar v. State of Haryana, Mihir Rajesh Shah v. State of Maharashtra, Kasireddy Upender Reddy v. State of Andhra Pradesh, Radhika Agarwal v. Union of India, Dr. Rajinder Rajan v. Union of India, Kishan Chand v. State of Haryana, and Ashish Kakkar v. U.T. Chandigarh, the Court reiterated that communication of written grounds of arrest is not a procedural ritual but an indispensable constitutional safeguard flowing from Article 22(1).

The Court emphasised that an arrest memo cannot be equated with the written grounds of arrest. It further held that the written grounds must be communicated not only to the arrested person but also to the relative or friend nominated by the arrestee, and must be supplied sufficiently before production before the Magistrate so as to enable effective exercise of the constitutional right to legal representation.

Examining the material on record, the Court found that the arrest memo merely recorded the petitioner’s arrest and informed her of the consequences of the alleged offences. Although her father-in-law had been informed about the fact of her arrest, neither the arrest memo nor the intimation memo disclosed that the specific written grounds of arrest had been communicated to either of them. The Court therefore found prima facie non-compliance with Article 22(1) of the Constitution read with Section 52(1) of the NDPS Act.

The Court also noted that no narcotic substance had been recovered from the petitioner, that she had already undergone more than nine months of custody, that the trial had barely commenced, and that she was a young woman responsible for the care of a two-and-a-half-year-old child. While refraining from expressing any opinion on the merits of the allegations under Section 27-A, the Court held that continued incarceration in these circumstances would serve no useful purpose and would amount to an unwarranted deprivation of personal liberty.

Decision: The Punjab and Haryana High Court allowed the petition and granted regular bail to the petitioner, holding that the prima facie violation of the constitutional safeguards governing arrest, absence of recovery, prolonged incarceration, and the petitioner’s personal circumstances justified release on bail, subject to stringent conditions.