Under Article 22(2) of the Constitution of India, every person who is arrested and detained in custody must be produced before the nearest magistrate -

Article 22(1) of the Constitution guarantees that a person arrested shall not be detained without being informed of the grounds of arrest and shall be entitled to consult and be defended by a legal practitioner of his choice. Article 22(2) further provides that every person arrested and detained in custody shall be produced before the nearest magistrate within a period of twenty-four hours of such arrest, excluding the time necessary for the journey from the place of arrest to the court, and that no person shall be detained in custody beyond that period without the authority of a magistrate. The twenty-four hour rule is a mandatory constitutional safeguard against arbitrary detention. Periods of twelve, forty-eight or seventy-two hours find no support in the constitutional text.