SC: Police can’t serve notice or summon through WhatsApp or other electronic means | India News

NEW DELHI: Supreme Court has dominated WhatsApp or other electronic means can’t be utilized by police and other investigating companies to serve notice to an accused to seem earlier than it, Supreme Court has stated whereas rejecting the plea of Haryana govt to permit police to serve notice through electronic means as it could adversely have an effect on the freedom of the particular person.Pressing for electronic means of serving summons, the state submitted that the brand new regulation of Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita allowed use of electronic means for courtroom proceedings for issuance, service and execution of summons and warrant and that needs to be allowed to police additionally. But a bench of Justices M M Sundresh and N K Singh stated that summons issued by a courtroom is a judicial act, whereas a notice issued by the investigating company is an government act and the process prescribed for a judicial act can’t be learn into the process prescribed for an government act.The courtroom clarified that the problem of liberty is concerned within the case of police summon because the particular person will be arrested for non-compliance of summon and in such instances it’s applicable that such a notice be served in particular person on the accused, and never through the mode of electronic communication. It accepted the submission of senior advocate Siddharth Luthra who’s helping the courtroom as amicus curiae and instructed the bench that summons are to be served personally on the particular person, as per the common mode of service.“The protection of one’s liberty is a crucial aspect of the right to life guaranteed to each and every individual, under Article 21 of the Constitution. The procedure encapsulated in Section 35(6) of the BNSS, 2023, seeks to secure this fundamental right, from encroachment by the relevant Authority, and therefore, any attempt to interpret the provision as a mere procedural one, would amount to rewriting the provision itself ..The Legislature, in its wisdom, has specifically excluded the service of a notice under Section 35 of the BNSS from the ambit of procedures permissible through electronic communication,” the bench stated.“When viewed from any lens, we are unable to convince ourselves that electronic communication is a valid mode of service of notice under Section 35 of the BNSS, since its conscious omission is a clear manifestation of the legislative intent. Introducing a procedure into Section 35 of the BNSS, that has not been specifically provided for by the legislature, would be violative of its intent,” the Supreme Court bench stated.