IPC or BNS? Which Law Applies to Your Case in 2026

If the incident happened before 1 July 2024, you are still charged under the Indian Penal Code, even if the FIR is written in 2026. Procedure is a separate question, and it turns on what was already pending on 1 July 2024.

Two dials, not one. The first dial is the offence itself, and it is frozen by the date of the incident. The second dial is the machinery, meaning arrest, investigation, bail, trial and appeal, and that one moved on 1 July 2024. Mixing up the two dials is where people go wrong when they read their own FIR.

The three new codes replaced the old ones on the same day. The Ministry of Home Affairs notification S.O. 850(E) dated 23 February 2024 appointed 1 July 2024 for the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, except sub-section (2) of section 106. S.O. 848(E) did the same for the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, carrying the same carve-out through its First Schedule, and S.O. 849(E) brought in the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 with no exception at all.

Section 358 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 is headed “Repeal and savings”. Sub-section (1) repeals the Indian Penal Code. Sub-section (2) then says the repeal shall not affect:

• “any penalty, or punishment incurred in respect of any offences committed against the Code so repealed” - clause ©
• “any proceeding, investigation or remedy in respect of any such penalty or punishment as aforesaid, and any such proceeding or remedy may be instituted, continued or enforced, and any such penalty may be imposed as if that Code had not been repealed” - clause (e)

Read clause (e) slowly. The word is instituted, not merely continued. That is the legal reason a police station can register a brand new FIR in 2026 quoting IPC section 420 for a cheating that happened in 2022. The IPC is repealed for the future, but it stays alive for the past.

Section 358(4) then adds that nothing in sub-section (2) cuts down section 6 of the General Clauses Act, 1897, the general savings rule that already protects “any penalty, forfeiture or punishment incurred in respect of any offence committed against any enactment so repealed”.

On top of the statute sits Article 20(1) of the Constitution: “No person shall be convicted of any offence except for violation of a law in force at the time of the commission of the Act charged as an offence, nor be subjected to a penalty greater than that which might have been inflicted under the law in force at the time of the commission of the offence.”

So charging a May 2024 incident under a BNS section is not just untidy drafting. It runs into a fundamental right.

Section 531 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 is also headed “Repeal and savings”. Sub-section (1) repeals the CrPC. Sub-section (2)(a) is the one that matters to you:

“if, immediately before the date on which this Sanhita comes into force, there is any appeal, application, trial, inquiry or investigation pending, then, such appeal, application, trial, inquiry or investigation shall be disposed of, continued, held or made, as the case may be, in accordance with the provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, as in force immediately before such commencement, as if this Sanhita had not come into force.”

Notice what section 531 never mentions: the date of the offence. It asks one question only, and it is a snapshot question. Was something actually pending on 1 July 2024? If yes, that thing finishes under the CrPC. If nothing was pending, there is nothing to save.

Sub-section (3) closes a loophole in your disfavour: if a limitation period under the old Code had already expired before 1 July 2024, you cannot revive the application just because the new Sanhita gives a longer window.

The evidence law follows the same shape. Section 170 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 repeals the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 but keeps it alive for “any application, trial, inquiry, investigation, proceeding or appeal pending” on the changeover date.

The snapshot test sounds simple. In practice benches have drawn the line in three different places, and no Supreme Court judgment has settled it as of August 2026.

The FIR date view. In Krishan Joshi v. State of Rajasthan (Rajasthan High Court at Jodhpur, S.B. Criminal Misc. Petition No. 4285/2024, decided 9 July 2024), Justice Arun Monga held that an FIR registered before the changeover is itself a pending inquiry or investigation within section 531(2)(a), so the whole subsequent investigation and even the trial procedure stay under the CrPC.

The stage view. In Anil Kumar Yadav v. Directorate of Enforcement (High Court of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, CRM(M) No. 329/2025, decided 16 April 2025), Justice Sanjay Dhar held that the stage the case had reached on 1 July 2024 is what counts. If the case was at investigation, the investigation is completed under the CrPC, but “once the case progresses to the next stage after coming into the force of BNSS, then the subsequent stage has to be governed by the provisions contained in BNSS”.

The split view. In Chowgule and Company Pvt. Ltd. v. The Public Prosecutor, State of Goa (High Court of Bombay at Goa, Criminal Writ Petitions 618 and 619 of 2024, decided 2 August 2024), Justice Bharat P. Deshpande held that an FIR of 14 June 2024 meant the investigation was pending and had to continue under the CrPC. In the same judgment the court held that “what is saved is only pending application and not the applications to be filed subsequent to 01.07.2024”, so a fresh anticipatory bail application filed on 6 July 2024 had to be treated as an application under section 482 of the BNSS.

On the offence side there is far less noise. In Arunkumar v. The State of Karnataka (Karnataka High Court, Kalaburagi Bench, Criminal Petition No. 200913 of 2024, decided 30 September 2024), Justice K. Natarajan put it plainly: for offences committed before 1 July 2024 “the police required to register FIR for the offences under the IPC but, not under BNS”, while the investigation that begins after that date runs on BNSS rails.

There is one live procedural fault line you should know about. LiveLaw reported that in September 2024 a judge of the Punjab and Haryana High Court disagreed with an earlier ruling of the same court on whether every criminal petition filed after 1 July 2024 is governed by the BNSS even when the FIR is an IPC one, and referred the question to a larger bench. The outcome of that reference could not be verified against the primary record for this page, and no Supreme Court judgment settling the point was traceable in August 2026. Treat the last two rows of the table above as arguable, not settled.

A cheating complaint from 2022, FIR registered in March 2026. Charge sheet must cite IPC sections. Arrest, notice, search, bail and trial all run under the BNSS, because nothing was pending on 1 July 2024. Read when police may arrest without a warrant under BNSS section 35 before you assume you can simply be picked up.

A dowry cruelty FIR from January 2024, chargesheet filed in late 2024. Sections stay under IPC 498A. The investigation that was already running on 1 July 2024 is completed under the CrPC. What happens after cognizance is exactly the fight described above. If the incident had been after 1 July 2024 the section would be BNS section 85 instead.

A conviction appeal filed in 2023 and still pending. Squarely inside section 531(2)(a). The appeal is heard under the CrPC as if the BNSS had never arrived, and the offence remains the IPC offence you were convicted of.

1. Find the date of occurrence column in the FIR, not the date the FIR was written. That date picks the code.
2. Match every section quoted against that date. An IPC section for a post-July-2024 incident, or a BNS section for a pre-July-2024 incident, is worth raising in writing at the earliest hearing.
3. Check whether anything was actually pending on 1 July 2024. An FIR alone, a part-heard trial and a filed appeal are all different animals under section 531.
4. If the police will not give you a copy of the FIR, chargesheet or closure report, the RTI route to certified copies usually works faster than repeat visits to the station.
5. Keep your arrest and FIR rights handy, and if the station refuses to register at all, use the Zero FIR route.

The offence sections stay under the IPC, because the incident predates 1 July 2024 and BNS section 358(2) protects punishments incurred under the repealed Code. The procedural question is contested. On the Rajasthan High Court view the whole investigation and trial run under the CrPC. On the Jammu and Kashmir view only the stage that was actually running on 1 July 2024 stays under the CrPC and the next stage shifts to the BNSS.

Yes, on the reasoning of the Karnataka High Court in Arunkumar, where the court said police must register an IPC FIR for a pre-1 July 2024 offence. It is also an Article 20(1) point if the BNS punishment is heavier than the IPC punishment was. Raise it in writing before the Magistrate rather than assuming the mistake will fix itself.

Article 20(1) is a shield against a heavier retrospective punishment, not an automatic ticket to the lighter new one. But in T. Barai v. Henry Ah Hoe (Supreme Court, decided 7 December 1982) the Court held that only retroactive criminal legislation is prohibited by Article 20(1), and that where an amendment reduces the punishment there is no constitutional bar to the accused getting that benefit. Whether that reasoning fits your particular IPC to BNS change is an argument for your trial court, not a settled rule.

Not to that trial. A trial pending immediately before 1 July 2024 is expressly saved by section 531(2)(a) and is held under the CrPC as if the BNSS had not come into force. The new BNSS clocks apply to trials that begin on the BNSS side of the line. Two examples: section 251(1)(b) requires a Sessions Judge to frame charge in writing within sixty days from the date of the first hearing on charge, and section 392(1) requires judgment to be pronounced not later than forty-five days after the trial ends.

The Bombay High Court at Goa in Chowgule held that a fresh anticipatory bail application filed after 1 July 2024 must be treated as one under section 482 of the BNSS, because section 531 saves only applications that were already pending. Other judges have leaned the other way, and that is exactly the question a Punjab and Haryana larger bench was asked to answer. Practical answer: file under BNSS section 482 and add a line that the petition may be read under CrPC section 438 in the alternative. Our guide to anticipatory bail under BNSS 482 walks through the drafting.

No, if the trial or proceeding was pending on 1 July 2024. Section 170 of the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 keeps the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 alive for any application, trial, inquiry, investigation, proceeding or appeal that was pending on that date.

Section 106(2) of the BNS punishes causing death by rash and negligent driving and then escaping without reporting to a police officer or Magistrate, with imprisonment up to ten years. The commencement notification S.O. 850(E) expressly brought the BNS into force “except the provision of sub-section (2) of section 106”. Confirm the current status of that sub-section before relying on it either way, because it can be notified separately at any time. Section 106(1), which carries up to five years, was notified normally.

India Code carries the enacted text of all three codes section by section, and the Ministry of Home Affairs hosts the gazette commencement notifications. Links are in the sources below. For a plain-language walkthrough of how citizens use the law and the RTI Act together, see The RTI Playbook.

Ask two questions in this order. When did it happen, and what was already pending on 1 July 2024. The first answer names your offence. The second answer names your procedure. If the honest reply to the second is “nothing was pending”, you are on the new machinery even though the charge itself is an old one, and that is not a contradiction. It is exactly what BNS section 358 and BNSS section 531 were drafted to produce.

If a public authority is sitting on the papers you need to answer either question, the RTI drafting tool will build the application for you, and the RTI Act reference explains the timelines you can hold them to.

• Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 on India Code, section 358
• Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 on India Code, section 531
• Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 on India Code, section 170
• General Clauses Act, 1897 on India Code, section 6
• MHA gazette notification S.O. 850 E dated 23 February 2024
• MHA gazette notification S.O. 848 E dated 23 February 2024
• MHA gazette notification S.O. 849 E dated 23 February 2024
• Constitution of India, Legislative Department, Article 20
• Arunkumar v. State of Karnataka, Karnataka High Court, 30 September 2024
• Krishan Joshi v. State of Rajasthan, Rajasthan High Court, 9 July 2024
• Chowgule and Company Pvt. Ltd. v. Public Prosecutor, State of Goa, Bombay High Court at Goa, 2 August 2024
• Anil Kumar Yadav v. Directorate of Enforcement, High Court of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh, 16 April 2025
• T. Barai v. Henry Ah Hoe, Supreme Court of India, 7 December 1982
• LiveLaw report on the Punjab and Haryana High Court larger bench reference, September 2024

This page explains the law in general terms and is not advice on your specific matter. It was last checked in August 2026 by the RTI Wiki editorial desk, reviewed by Dr. Shrawan Kumar Pathak.