Introduction — History, Scheme; Transition from IPC to BNS, 2023

The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (BNS) — which received the President's assent on 25 December 2023 and came into force on 1 July 2024 — is the new general penal Code of India. It replaces the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (IPC), the Code drafted by the First Indian Law Commission under the chairmanship of Lord Thomas Babington Macaulay and enacted as Act XLV of 1860. The IPC governed Indian criminal law for almost a hundred and sixty-four years. The BNS now does. To read the new Code well, you must read it against the old.

This chapter sets the stage for everything that follows in our IPC and BNS notes series. It does three things in turn: it traces the history of the IPC from Macaulay's draft to its enactment; it sets out the scheme of the old Code and the new; and it explains the legal mechanics of the transition — what was repealed, what survives, and how pending cases under the IPC are saved.

The architects of the Indian Penal Code, 1860

The IPC was the work of the First Indian Law Commission, constituted under the Charter Act, 1833. Its president was Thomas Babington Macaulay, then Law Member of the Governor-General's Council. The other Commissioners were J. M. Macleod, G. W. Anderson and F. Millett. Macaulay arrived in India in 1834 and immediately set the Commission to work on a single, exhaustive penal Code that would replace the patchwork of Mohammedan criminal law, English criminal law and East India Company Regulations then administered in different parts of the country.

Before the IPC, criminal law in India was a study in fragmentation. In the Presidency towns of Bombay, Calcutta and Madras, English criminal law as amended by several Acts was administered. In the mofussil — the country districts beyond the Presidency towns — the Bengal and Madras Presidencies continued to apply the Mohammedan criminal law, the glaring defects of which had been patched only partially by Regulations of the local Governments. Bombay Presidency had revised its judicial system in 1827 and from that time applied a Regulation defining offences and specifying punishments; but the Bengal and Madras systems remained in force until the IPC superseded them. A single, uniform criminal Code for British India was therefore long overdue.

Macaulay drafted the bulk of the Code himself. He drew on the English common law of crimes, on Livingston's Code of Louisiana, on the French Code Pénal of 1810, and on his own deep familiarity with the doctrinal foundations of mens rea, attempt and conspiracy. He submitted the Draft Penal Code to the Governor-General in October 1837. It was an extraordinary piece of drafting — terse, illustrated, organised around principles rather than enumerated wrongs — and it remained the spine of the Code that was eventually enacted.

From Macaulay's draft to enactment in 1860

The Draft Penal Code of 1837 did not become law for over twenty years. It was sent for examination to the Judges of the Supreme Court at Calcutta and to the Sadr Diwani Adalats at the three Presidency towns. Their criticisms, together with revisions by Sir Barnes Peacock and other Commissioners of the Second Law Commission, were absorbed into successive drafts. The revisions were complete by 1850. The Indian Mutiny of 1857 then intervened. The Code finally received the assent of the Governor-General in Council on 6 October 1860 and was enacted as Act No. XLV of 1860 — the Indian Penal Code — to come into operation on 1 January 1862.

The Code that was enacted retained Macaulay's organising idea: a Code of general principles followed by a catalogue of specific offences. Chapter II ("General Explanations") collected the definitions; Chapter III ("Of Punishments") set out the kinds and quantum of sentence; Chapter IV ("General Exceptions") collected the doctrines that strip an act of its criminality; and the substantive Chapters V to XXIII enumerated the offences themselves. The drafting strategy was one of brevity: rather than repeat in every penal section the qualifying ingredients of intention, voluntariness and absence of privilege, those negative ingredients were concentrated in the General Provisions and made universal by Section 6 IPC.

The IPC was treated by the Supreme Court as exhaustive in its field. In M. C. Verghese v. Ponnan, AIR 1970 SC 1876, the Court held that the IPC, 1860 exhaustively codifies the law relating to offences with which it deals, and the rules of the common law cannot be resorted to for inventing exemptions which are not expressly enacted. Equally, the Court directed in Mobarik Ali v. State of Bombay, AIR 1957 SC 857, that it is not necessary, and indeed not permissible, to construe the Code in accordance with the notions of criminal jurisdiction that prevailed when it was enacted; the Code may legitimately be read with reference to modern needs unless a particular provision indicates the contrary. That interpretive principle survives the BNS.

The structure of the IPC, 1860

By the time of repeal, the IPC contained 511 sections distributed across 23 chapters. Chapters I to V dealt with introductory matters, definitions, punishments, general exceptions, and abetment — the general part of the Code. Chapter V-A (inserted later) dealt with criminal conspiracy. Chapters VI to XV covered offences against the State, against public tranquillity, against public servants, against public justice, relating to coin and stamps, weights and measures, public health, and religion. Chapter XVI — by far the longest — covered offences affecting the human body, including culpable homicide, murder, hurt, kidnapping and sexual offences. Chapter XVII covered offences against property. Chapters XVIII to XXIII dealt with documents and property marks, criminal breach of contract, marriage, defamation and criminal intimidation.

This architecture had one further feature that practitioners and aspirants must internalise. The general principles in Chapters I to V applied to every substantive offence in the later chapters. When you read Section 300 IPC (murder), you were not reading the whole offence — you were reading the offence minus its defences. The defences lived in Chapter IV. That structural choice is preserved in the BNS, although the chapter numbering has changed.

Why a new criminal code in 2023

Three rationales were offered in Parliament for replacing the IPC. The first was decolonisation. The Statement of Objects and Reasons accompanying the BNS emphasised that the IPC was a colonial enactment drafted by an English Law Member to serve the administrative ends of the East India Company and the Crown. Many of its provisions — sedition under Section 124A, the criminalisation of "carnal intercourse against the order of nature" under Section 377, the language of "modesty of a woman" under Section 354 — bore visible marks of nineteenth-century English social attitudes that have since been disowned by Indian constitutional courts. Parliament's stated aim was to enact a Code that reflects contemporary Indian values rather than imperial ones.

The second rationale was modernisation. The IPC contained no offence dealing specifically with terrorism, organised crime, snatching or mob lynching. Each of these had been litigated under more general provisions — terrorist acts under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, organised crime under State legislation such as the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act, 1999, snatching under theft and robbery, mob lynching under common-intention principles read with the offences against the human body. The BNS introduces dedicated provisions for each. We deal with them in detail in later chapters of this series — Terrorist Act under Section 113 BNS, Organised Crime under Section 111 BNS, Snatching under Section 304 BNS and Mob Lynching under Section 103(2) BNS.

The third rationale was sentencing reform. The IPC's punishment scheme was binary — imprisonment or fine — with solitary confinement as a rarely-imposed third option. The BNS introduces community service as a fourth kind of punishment for petty offences, marking a structural shift from purely retributive sentencing toward restorative options. The new sentence is examined separately in the chapter on community service as a BNS innovation.

The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita — enactment and commencement

The BNS was passed by the Lok Sabha on 20 December 2023 and by the Rajya Sabha on 21 December 2023. It received the assent of the President on 25 December 2023 and was published in the Gazette of India the same day. The Ministry of Home Affairs notified 1 July 2024 as the date of commencement. From that date, the IPC stands repealed by Section 358 BNS (the savings clause, examined below) and the BNS becomes the operative general penal Code.

The BNS was enacted as part of a package of three statutes which together replaced the colonial-era criminal-law trinity. The Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (BNSS) replaces the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 — examined in our CrPC-to-BNSS transition chapter. The Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 (BSA) replaces the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 — see the Evidence Act and BSA introduction. All three Sanhitas commenced on 1 July 2024. The BNS therefore cannot be read in isolation from its procedural and evidentiary counterparts; an FIR registered after 1 July 2024 will be registered under BNSS, will charge offences under BNS, and will be tried on evidence governed by BSA.

Architecture of the BNS — chapters and section count

The BNS contains 358 sections distributed across 20 chapters. The IPC contained 511 sections across 23 chapters. The reduction is largely the result of consolidation: definitions that were spread across sixteen separate sections from Sections 8 to 52A IPC are now collected as numbered sub-sections of Section 2 BNS. The five sections of the IPC dealing with extent and application (Sections 1 to 5 IPC) are folded into the six sub-sections of Section 1 BNS. The General Explanations of Sections 6, 7, 27, 32, 34, 35, 36, 37 and 38 IPC are folded into the nine sub-sections of Section 3 BNS. The substantive chapter-numbering is otherwise broadly familiar to anyone trained on the IPC.

The chapter map of the BNS reads as follows: Chapter I (Preliminary) corresponds to Sections 1 to 3 BNS; Chapter II (Punishments) to Sections 4 to 13; Chapter III (General Exceptions and Right of Private Defence) to Sections 14 to 44; Chapter IV (Abetment, Criminal Conspiracy and Attempt) to Sections 45 to 62; Chapter V (Offences Against Woman and Child, including rape, sexual offences and offences relating to marriage) to Sections 63 to 99; Chapter VI (Offences Affecting Human Body, including culpable homicide, murder, hurt, kidnapping, organised crime, terrorism, snatching) to Sections 100 to 146; and so on. Each of these is examined in its own chapter of this series.

What BNS retains from the IPC

The headline truth is that the BNS retains far more than it changes. Out of 358 sections in the BNS, the substantive content of more than 280 reproduces the corresponding IPC provision either verbatim or with cosmetic edits — replacing the word "Code" with "Sanhita", replacing "Court of Justice" with "Court", or rephrasing "denotes" as "means". The doctrine of mens rea, the structure of culpable homicide and murder, the elements of theft, robbery, dacoity and cheating, the architecture of the General Exceptions and the Right of Private Defence, the framework of abetment and criminal conspiracy, and the law of attempt are all carried forward without disturbance.

This continuity matters for two reasons. First, the corpus of Supreme Court and High Court decisions interpreting the IPC over more than a century continues to govern the BNS. K. M. Nanavati v. State of Maharashtra, AIR 1962 SC 605, on grave and sudden provocation; Virsa Singh v. State of Punjab, AIR 1958 SC 465, on Section 300 thirdly (now Section 101(c) BNS); Reg v. Govinda, ILR (1876) 1 Bom 342, on the distinction between culpable homicide and murder; Bachan Singh v. State of Punjab, (1980) 2 SCC 684, on the rarest-of-rare doctrine — all remain authoritative. The second reason is pedagogical: a student who has learned IPC well has learned the bulk of the BNS by another name. The challenge is to relearn the section numbers, not the law.

What BNS changes — the headline innovations

Five categories of change matter most. The first is the introduction of new offences. Terrorism (Section 113 BNS), organised crime (Section 111), petty organised crime (Section 112), mob lynching as an aggravated form of murder (Section 103(2)), snatching as an offence distinct from theft (Section 304), and sexual intercourse by deceitful means (Section 69 BNS — examined in our chapter on Section 69 BNS) are all new. None had a direct IPC equivalent. Each is dealt with in its own chapter of this series.

The second is the reframing of an old offence. The colonial offence of sedition under Section 124A IPC, struck down in part by the Supreme Court and held in abeyance by the Court's order of 11 May 2022 in S. G. Vombatkere v. Union of India, has been replaced by Section 152 BNS — the offence of endangering the sovereignty, unity and integrity of India. The new offence is narrower in form and broader in some respects than its predecessor; we examine the doctrinal continuity and break in our chapter on Section 152 BNS.

The third is the introduction of community service as a kind of punishment under Section 4(f) BNS. The IPC recognised five kinds of punishment: death, life imprisonment, imprisonment, forfeiture of property and fine. The BNS adds a sixth — community service — for petty offences such as defamation, public-servant disobeying lawful order, attempt to commit suicide to compel a public servant, and small thefts. The full sentencing framework is examined in the punishments chapter.

The fourth is the rationalisation of definitions. The definition of "child" appears for the first time in Section 2(3) BNS — a person below the age of eighteen years. "Document" under Section 2(8) BNS now expressly includes electronic and digital records. "Gender" under Section 2(10) BNS adds transgender as a recognised category alongside male and female. The definition of "movable property" under Section 2(21) BNS has been broadened by removing the limiting word "corporeal" that appeared in Section 22 IPC. Each of these refinements is examined in our chapter on definitions.

The fifth is enhancement of punishment for several existing offences. Several offences against women and children now carry higher sentences. Hit-and-run with failure to report (Section 106(2) BNS) carries an enhanced punishment of up to ten years. The aggregate effect is to make the BNS a more punitive Code at the upper end while introducing community service at the lower end — a deliberate widening of the sentencing spectrum.

The savings clause — Section 358 BNS and pending IPC cases

The transitional provision is Section 358 BNS. It is the direct counterpart of Section 6 of the General Clauses Act, 1897. Section 358 BNS provides that the repeal of the IPC by the BNS shall not affect the previous operation of the IPC, any right or liability accrued under it, any penalty incurred, or any investigation, legal proceeding or remedy in respect of such right, liability or penalty. The effect is straightforward: an offence committed before 1 July 2024 must be tried under the IPC; an offence committed on or after 1 July 2024 must be charged under the BNS.

Two corollaries follow. The first is temporal: the date of commission of the offence — not the date of registration of the FIR or the date of trial — fixes the applicable Code. A murder committed at 11.59 p.m. on 30 June 2024, even if the FIR is registered at 10 a.m. on 1 July 2024, is governed by Section 302 IPC, not Section 103 BNS. The second is procedural: although the substantive offence is governed by the IPC for pre-1 July 2024 conduct, the procedure governing investigation, arrest, charge-sheet and trial is governed by the BNSS, because the BNSS commenced on the same day with its own savings clause framed in identical terms. A pre-1 July 2024 IPC offence will therefore typically be tried as an IPC offence under BNSS procedure on BSA-governed evidence — a triadic transition that practitioners must hold in mind.

Continuity of case law under the new code

One of the most common questions students ask in the first few months of the new Code is whether the old case law still applies. The short answer is yes, with one qualification. Where the BNS has reproduced the substance of the IPC provision, the case law decided under the IPC continues to govern the BNS provision, subject to citation in the new form. Bapu v. State of Rajasthan, (2007) 8 SCC 66, on the distinction between legal insanity and medical insanity, is now authority for Section 22 BNS (previously Section 84 IPC). State of Andhra Pradesh v. Rayavarapu Punnayya, (1976) 4 SCC 382, on the distinction between culpable homicide and murder, is now authority for Sections 100 and 101 BNS (previously Sections 299 and 300 IPC). The doctrine survives even though the section numbers have changed.

The qualification is this: where the BNS has changed the substantive content of a provision — by adding an element, removing an Explanation, narrowing a defence, or enhancing a punishment — the IPC case law on the changed point ceases to apply, and the BNS provision must be read on its own terms. The correspondence table in our chapter on the IPC-to-BNS section mapping flags these substantive changes against each section.

Implications for practitioners and aspirants

For the practitioner, the practical effect of 1 July 2024 is the discipline of dual citation. Every charge-sheet, every order, every judgment that touches an offence committed close to the commencement date must specify which Code applies and why. Every brief must verify the date of commission before identifying the section. The discipline is not new — practitioners trained on the transition from the Indian Penal Code, 1860 to the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 will recognise it — but it is exacting and the courts have begun to insist on precision.

For the aspirant, the practical effect is the discipline of dual learning. Examination papers conducted from 2024 onwards routinely cite both the IPC and the BNS section in the same question. The judicial-services examinations conducted by the Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Delhi High Courts in 2024 and 2025 have moved to a dual-citation format. The CLAT PG paper of 2025 and the SEBI Legal Officer paper of 2024 followed suit. A student who can recite Section 302 IPC but cannot place its successor as Section 103 BNS will lose the question. The architecture of these notes — leading with the BNS section and citing the IPC parenthetically — is deliberately calibrated to the way the examination now expects you to think.

Constitutional challenges and pending litigation

The BNS is presently the subject of constitutional challenges before the Supreme Court. The most prominent concern Section 152 BNS (the successor to sedition), challenged on overbreadth grounds, and the absence of an explicit recognition of marital rape as an offence, challenged on Article 14 and Article 21 grounds. These petitions are pending and the law on these points remains unsettled. We do not pre-judge the litigation in our notes; where the Supreme Court has reserved judgment, we say so.

Two further pieces of pending litigation are worth flagging at the outset. The first concerns the constitutional validity of the BNS provisions on organised crime, challenged on the ground that organised crime is a State subject under Entry 1 of List II and that the Union Parliament could not have legislated on it without recourse to Article 252. The second concerns the validity of Section 69 BNS (sexual intercourse by deceitful means), challenged on the ground of vagueness in the definition of "deceitful means". The petitions are tagged for hearing.

Reading the IPC and BNS together — a strategic note

The structure of these notes follows three rules that are worth declaring at the outset, since they govern every chapter that follows. First, the BNS is the primary statutory anchor. Section numbers cited in the body of any chapter will lead with the BNS section, with the IPC section appearing parenthetically once after the BNS section is established, and dropping out of subsequent mentions in the same chapter. Second, the case law is cited in its original form — Virsa Singh v. State of Punjab, AIR 1958 SC 465, is cited as Virsa Singh, not as "Virsa Singh, an IPC case". The doctrine attached to the case is, however, restated in BNS terms. Third, where the BNS has changed the substantive content of a provision, the change is flagged explicitly; the IPC position is not paraphrased as if it still applied.

The next chapter takes up the first substantive question of the Code: where does it apply, to whom, and from what point in time. We turn to the extent and application of the BNS, including its intra-territorial reach under Section 1(3), its extra-territorial operation under Sections 1(4) and 1(5), and the saving for special and local laws under Section 1(6). After that, we move to the consolidated definitions of Section 2 BNS and the general exceptions of Sections 14 to 44 BNS, before turning to the substantive offences in the chapters that follow.

Frequently asked questions

When did the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 come into force, and what does it replace?

The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (BNS) received the President's assent on 25 December 2023 and was brought into force on 1 July 2024 by a Ministry of Home Affairs notification. From that date, it replaces the Indian Penal Code, 1860 as the general penal Code of India. It was enacted alongside the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (replacing the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973) and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 (replacing the Indian Evidence Act, 1872), all three commencing on the same day.

Does the IPC still apply to offences committed before 1 July 2024?

Yes. Section 358 BNS, read with Section 6 of the General Clauses Act, 1897, saves the previous operation of the IPC. The date of commission of the offence — not the date of registration of the FIR or the date of trial — fixes the applicable Code. A murder committed on 30 June 2024 is tried under Section 302 IPC even if the FIR is registered after 1 July 2024. A murder committed on or after 1 July 2024 is charged under Section 103 BNS. Procedure, however, is governed by the BNSS in both cases, since the BNSS commenced on the same day.

Does case law decided under the IPC still apply under the BNS?

For provisions whose substantive content the BNS has retained without change, IPC case law continues to govern the BNS provision. Authorities such as Virsa Singh on Section 300 thirdly, Reg v. Govinda on culpable homicide and murder, K. M. Nanavati on grave and sudden provocation, and Bachan Singh on the rarest-of-rare doctrine remain authoritative. The doctrine attaches to the new section number. Where the BNS has changed the substance — added an element, removed an Explanation, or enhanced punishment — the IPC case law on that changed point ceases to apply.

What are the principal new offences introduced by the BNS?

The BNS introduces six classes of new or freshly-framed offences: terrorism (Section 113 BNS), organised crime (Section 111), petty organised crime (Section 112), mob lynching as an aggravated form of murder (Section 103(2)), snatching as an offence distinct from theft (Section 304), and sexual intercourse by deceitful means (Section 69). It also recasts the offence of sedition under Section 124A IPC as Section 152 BNS — endangering the sovereignty, unity and integrity of India. Community service is added as a new kind of punishment under Section 4(f) BNS for petty offences.

Why was the Indian Penal Code replaced after almost 164 years?

Three rationales were placed before Parliament. The first was decolonisation — the IPC was a colonial enactment drafted by Macaulay to serve the East India Company and the Crown, and several of its provisions reflected nineteenth-century English social attitudes since disowned by Indian constitutional courts. The second was modernisation — the IPC contained no dedicated provisions on terrorism, organised crime, snatching or mob lynching, each of which had been litigated under more general or special-law provisions. The third was sentencing reform — the BNS introduces community service as a fourth kind of punishment for petty offences.

How many sections and chapters does the BNS contain compared to the IPC?

The IPC contained 511 sections distributed across 23 chapters. The BNS contains 358 sections across 20 chapters. The reduction is largely the result of consolidation rather than deletion: the sixteen separate definition sections of the IPC (Sections 8 to 52A) are folded into Section 2 BNS as numbered sub-sections; the five sections on extent and application (Sections 1 to 5 IPC) become the six sub-sections of Section 1 BNS; and the General Explanations of nine separate IPC sections are gathered into Section 3 BNS. The substantive content survives in compressed form.