Indian Penal Code, 1860 · Chapter III: Of Punishments
Section 72: Punishment of person guilty of one of several offences, the judgment stating that it is doubtful of which
The Indian Penal Code, 1860 was repealed and replaced by the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 from 1 July 2024. It still applies to matters and proceedings from before that date, as the repealing law provides.
In plain words
Where a judgment finds a person guilty of one of several specified offences but it is doubtful which, they are punished for the offence carrying the lowest punishment, if the punishments differ.
A simplified explanation, prepared with AI assistance from the official text below and checked automatically against it for numbers and cross-references. The official text is the law and prevails over this summary. Not legal advice.
Official text
In all cases in which judgment is given that a person is guilty of one of several offences specified in the judgment, but that it is doubtful of which of these offences he is guilty, the offender shall be punished for the offence for which the lowest punishment is provided if the same punishment is not provided for all.
Corresponding sections were matched by comparing the wording of both official texts, and for the IPC and BNS, also against a published correspondence table. Wording, punishments and structure often changed, so read both sections before relying on the match.
Source: India Code (Legislative Department), the text of the Act as it stood before its repeal. Words in square brackets [ ] were inserted or substituted by later amending Acts, and *** marks words omitted by an amendment. The amendment footnotes are not reproduced here.