Authority to Arrest

While different authorities in law have the right to make arrests, they are generally carried out by the police. Please read our explainer to understand more about arrests by police.

Besides the police, the law also gives power to Magistrates, to arrest people and take them into custody, if the person has committed an offence. There are two types of Magistrates i.e. Executive Magistrates and Judicial Magistrates. An example of an Executive Magistrate is Tehsildar. A Judicial Magistrate is a judge.  

Under certain circumstances, the law does permit ordinary people to make arrests if they witness someone committing a very serious crime. In such cases, the person arresting can’t detain them but instead must take them to the nearest police station without any unnecessary delay and hand them over to a police officer.