Context:

• Within minutes of an arrest anywhere in India, a face — handcuffed, flanked by policemen, sometimes garlanded with placards cataloguing the crime — starts circulating on social media, often before the accused is even produced before a magistrate.
• A Supreme Court PIL seeking a nationwide media protocol for police briefings has forced a question Indian policing has quietly avoided: under what law is this done, should it be done, and where should it stop?
• In this context, this article highlights the legal uncertainty surrounding police publicity of accused persons, examining investigative necessity, constitutional safeguards, presumption of innocence and the need for a uniform national protocol.

Why the Practice Exists?

• The justification for publicity is genuine. Photographs of wanted persons and reward notices have:
  • Solved crimes.
  • Helped recover missing children.
  • Brought fugitives to book years after trails went cold.
• The public, once alerted, has achieved what a thinly stretched police force alone could not. But as the experts note, the justification is strong; the legal architecture is weak.

The Legal Patchwork

• No single statute permits or prohibits police from publishing photographs of accused persons.
• Instead, a patchwork of colonial-era regulations and general procedural powers is stretched to cover the practice.
• Absconder Proclamations
  • Section 84 of the BNSS, 2023 (earlier Section 82 of the CrPC) allows courts to proclaim absconders and publish proclamations in newspapers.
  • It says nothing about photographs — attaching one is merely settled practice.
  • Crucially, this process triggers only after a warrant fails; it offers no legal basis for publicity at the earlier investigation stage.
• Investigation-Stage Publicity
  • This rests on the general powers of an Investigating Officer (IO) — every person must assist police in preventing and investigating offences, and an IO may examine anyone with relevant information.
  • Publishing photographs to solicit identification or trace absconders is essentially a digital-age extension of the colonial-era "Hue and Cry Notice" found in State Police Manuals, whose broad language ("description of the subject") is stretched to plausibly cover photographs.
• Reward Announcements
  • These announcements stand on firmer but narrower ground — governed by State Police Regulations under the Police Act, 1861, with sanctioning authority ranging from the Station House Officer (SHO) to the State government.
  • This requires no prior warrant; it is purely administrative discretion.
• A Common Misconception
  • The Criminal Procedure (Identification) Act, 2022 governs the taking, storage and use of identification measurements, including photographs.
  • It is often wrongly cited as authorising their publication — but it says nothing about circulation at all.

The Constitutional Concern

• Jurisprudence around Article 21 has sharpened, not softened, on this issue. The presumption of innocence remains central to criminal justice.
• Courts increasingly recognise that broadcasting an arrested person's face as a fait accompli of guilt, before any charge is even framed, can cause real, irreversible harm.
• The Rajasthan High Court termed such practices "institutional humiliation."
• Digital circulation is permanent, searchable, and indifferent to a later acquittal — the damage cannot be undone even if the person is cleared.

Policy Developments So Far

• July 2024: The Bureau of Police Research and Development (BPRD) prepared a draft manual on media briefings by police and shared it with the Ministry of Home Affairs.
• January 2026: The Supreme Court noted that an amicus had prepared a Police Manual for Media Briefing and directed States to evolve appropriate policies based on it within three months.
• Existing Absolute Red Lines
  • A juvenile in conflict with law cannot be identified except in the child's best interest, and only with the Juvenile Justice Board's permission.
  • A sexual assault survivor's identity is legally protected.
• The real, unsettled debate concerns the ordinary adult — accused, arrested, but not yet tried.

The Distinction That Matters

• Publication of an accused's photograph sits on a scale:
  • One end: Legitimate investigative necessity — crime prevention, public order, law-and-order purposes.
  • Other end: Showcasing police achievements — where photographs are released merely to serve police optics at the accused's expense, prejudicing public opinion before trial even begins.

How Other Countries Handle It?

• United States: "Wanted" notices are treated as public-record exceptions to privacy law, but agencies are trained to frame them carefully — using terms like "alleged" and "wanted for questioning" — to preserve the presumption of innocence even while seeking public help.
• United Kingdom: A more conservative approach — police withhold arrested persons' identities altogether.

What Is Needed?

• An outright ban on soliciting public assistance would be legally unwarranted and self-defeating.
• Instead, India needs a codified, uniform national protocol that:
  • Distinguishes proportionate, need-based disclosure from prejudicial publicity.
  • Mandates blackout categories — juveniles, sexual-offence complainants.
  • Requires time-bound review and takedown once the investigative purpose is served, or the accused is discharged or acquitted.
  • Applies uniformly across States, ending the current patchwork.

Conclusion

• Public help has genuinely solved crimes — but convenience is not the same as legality.
• Before any photograph goes out, one question should decide it: is the disclosure necessary to the investigation, or merely convenient to the narrative?
• Until that question is codified into law, India's policing will keep confusing publicity with justice.