Search Results
Section 42 of the NDPS Act: The Architecture of India's Most Litigated Search-and-Seizure Safeguard- Explainer
The writing of the secret information. The dispatch to the immediate superior. The reasons for a search after sunset. Section 42 of the NDPS Act is, on paper, a procedural provision — but the Supreme Court has treated ea...
Section 50 of the NDPS Act: The Search of the Person, the Right to Notice, and the Question of the Bag
An explainer on India's most litigated NDPS procedural safeguard — the statutory text, the Constitution Bench line from Balbir Singh to Vijaysinh Jadeja, the bag-versus-body distinction settled in Ranjan Kumar Chadha, an...
Section 52A NDPS Act: Disposal of Seized Narcotic Drugs & Psychotropic Substances — A Complete Legal Guide
Section 52A of the NDPS Act, 1985 governs the disposal of seized narcotic drugs and psychotropic substances. This article provides a comprehensive analysis of all four sub-sections, the 7-step statutory procedure, landma...
NDPS Act Explained: How Five High Courts Held That Quantity Equal to the Commercial Threshold Is Not Commercial Quantity
From the Himachal Pradesh Full Bench in Ratto (2003) to the Rajasthan High Court at Jodhpur in Samrath (2026), a pan-India survey of the bail and conviction decisions that have held a recovery exactly equal to the notifi...
Tofan Singh: NDPS Officers Are Police Officers, Section 67 Statements Cannot Be Used as Confessions
By a 2:1 majority, the Supreme Court held that officers invested with powers under Section 53 of the NDPS Act are "police officers" under Section 25 of the Evidence Act, so confessions made to them cannot be used to conv...
Section 50 NDPS Not Attracted to Bag Search; Written Waiver of Right Required Henceforth, Supreme Court Holds
The Supreme Court upheld a conviction for 1.25 kg of charas found in a bag the accused carried on his shoulder. Although Section 50 of the NDPS Act was breached by offering him a third option of being searched by the pol...
Supreme Court Upholds NDPS Conviction, Lays Down Ten-Point Guide On Section 52A Compliance
The Supreme Court has upheld a 15-year NDPS conviction, rejecting the claim that mixing 73 seized packets before drawing samples breached Section 52A. It found no procedural lapse on the record, and separately held that...
Hira Singh: Weight of Neutral Substance Counts for NDPS Small and Commercial Quantity; E. Micheal Raj Overruled
A three-Judge Bench of the Supreme Court held that when a narcotic drug or psychotropic substance is seized mixed with neutral substances, the weight of the whole mixture, not just the pure drug content, decides whether...
Section 50 NDPS: Officer Must Inform Suspect of Right to Gazetted Officer or Magistrate, Constitution Bench Holds
A five-judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court held that an empowered officer about to search a person on prior information must inform him of his right to be searched before a Gazetted Officer or a Magistrate. Fai...