in their day to day work. For instance, in India, a total of 28, 49, 025 persons were arrested by the Police under various IPC crimes during the year 2009.6 There is enough data to show that the police do not use this power judiciously. The National Police Commission estimated that a large number of arrests made by the police were not only unnecessary from the point of view of controlling crime but needlessly imposed avoidable burden on the state exchequer in the form of expenditure on harbouring and maintaining the arrested persons in jails. The arrests were for minor offences and 43.2% of expenditure in the concerned jails was incurred on prisoners who ‘’need not have been arrested at all.’ One of the studies conducted on the basis of empirical data collected from different states in India confirmed these findings. It showed that the number of preventive arrests and arrests for petty offences were substantially large, the percentage of under trial prisoners was unusually high and most of them were there because they were not able to post bail or furnish sureties.7 In one such case documented by the National Human Rights Commission, a young man was picked up by the police for questioning in a theft case reported by his employer, taken to the police station and beaten mercilessly. According to the police, they had summoned him for questioning on June 13, 1995, released him and again called him on June 14; 1995.The investigation later revealed that the man was detained illegally in custody from June 8 to June 13. He consumed some poisonous substance on June 14, was rushed by the police to the hospital where he was brought dead. The Commission was distressed to see the ‘‘blatant manner in which the records had been tempered by the very people who were duty bound to maintain law and order and to uphold the rule of law.’’8 In another case investigated by the NHRC, a clerk of a bank was detained by the police in illegal custody for 13 days. This action of the police was in response to a case reported by that bank. The man was tortured, as a result of which, he sustained fracture of his neck and femur bone of the leg.9 6 NCRB, Crime in India 2009 7 Law Commission of India: Consultation paper on Law relating to arrest, Nov 2000 8 Case No 115016/24-98-99 9 Case No 9302/95-96/NHRC 22 Manual on Human Rights for Police Officers