CrPC · Chapter IV · Powers of superior officers of police, and aid to the Magistrates and the police
CrPC section 37, “Public when to assist Magistrates and police”, is now BNSS section 31 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, in force from 1 July 2024.
Now BNSS section 31, with the same duty. The specific reference to injury to “railway, canal, telegraph or” public property is dropped, leaving any injury to public property.
Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973
Every person is bound to assist a Magistrate or police officer reasonably demanding his aid—
(a) in the taking or preventing the escape of any other person whom such Magistrate or police officer is authorised to arrest; or
(b) in the prevention or suppression of a breach of the peace; or
(c) in the prevention of any injury attempted to be committed to any railway, canal, telegraph or public property.
Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023
Every person is bound to assist a Magistrate or police officer reasonably demanding his aid—
(a) in the taking or preventing the escape of any other person whom such Magistrate or police officer is authorised to arrest; or
(b) in the prevention or suppression of a breach of the peace; or
(c) in the prevention of any injury attempted to be committed to any public property.
The texts are India Code’s. The amendment markers and footnotes of the official print are left out, so the old section reads as it stood when it was repealed; State amendments are not shown. The PDFs linked below carry the full history.
The BNSS repealed the CrPC from 1 July 2024 (section 531(1)). Any appeal, application, trial, inquiry or investigation pending immediately before that date is disposed of under the CrPC as it then stood, as if the BNSS had not come into force (section 531(2)(a)). Anything not pending on that date follows the BNSS.
