Article 20: ex post facto laws, double jeopardy and self-incrimination

LUG-104 Constitutional Law-I, Unit III: Protection in respect of conviction for offences (Article 20). · LLB · 60 min

Article 20 gives every person three protections in the criminal process: no punishment under a law that did not exist when the act was done, no second prosecution and punishment for the same offence, and no compulsion to be a witness against oneself. The lecture reads each clause, fixes its ingredients, and works through the leading cases from Kedar Nath Bajoria and Maqbool Hussain to Kathi Kalu Oghad, Nandini Satpathy, Selvi and Ritesh Sinha. Every clause has been a short-note or 3.5-mark question in this paper.

Objectives

Explain the two limbs of Article 20(1) and the rule of beneficial retrospectivity.
State the ingredients of double jeopardy under Article 20(2) and distinguish it from section 300 CrPC (section 337 BNSS).
Apply the three conditions of Article 20(3) and the 'testimonial compulsion' test to fingerprints, handwriting, narco-analysis and voice samples.
Explain when the protection against self-incrimination begins and how it operates at the police station.
Write a 3.5 or 7-mark answer on any clause of Article 20 with the correct cases.

Slides

What Article 20 says
Article 20(1): the bar on ex post facto laws
Beneficial retrospectivity: Rattan Lal
Article 20(2): the rule against double jeopardy
Maqbool Hussain and Venkataraman: what counts as 'prosecution and punishment'
Article 20(3): three conditions and M.P. Sharma
Kathi Kalu Oghad: 'to be a witness' is testimonial compulsion
Nandini Satpathy: the privilege at the police station
Selvi and Ritesh Sinha: science meets Article 20(3)
Limits, overlaps and comparisons
How the examiner asks it

Loading the lecture…