Which of the following statements is/are correct? 1. First Law Commission recommended Indian Penal Code, 1860. 2. Indian Penal Code, 1860 has been completely replaced by the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023. Select the answer using the code given below:

Q: What is the answer to CDS (I) 2025 GK Q99?

C. Correct — C, Both 1 and 2. Statement 1 is the standard account of how the Indian Penal Code came to be written. The Charter Act of 1833 provided for a Law Commission, and the First Law Commission was constituted in 1834 with Thomas Babington Macaulay as its chairman. Its principal work was a draft penal code, prepared in the mid-1830s and submitted to the Governor-General in Council; the draft was then revised over two decades by later hands, notably Barnes Peacock, before the Code was passed on 6 October 1860 and brought into operation on 1 January 1862. The Code is dated 1860 because that is when it was enacted, not when it was written, so a statement that the First Law Commission recommended it is accurate. Statement 2 is also correct. The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 was passed by Parliament in December 2023, received assent on 25 December 2023 and came into effect on 1 July 2024; its repeal-and-savings clause repeals the Indian Penal Code, and it was brought in alongside the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, which replaced the Code of Criminal Procedure, and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, which replaced the Indian Evidence Act. One qualification belongs in the record: as with any repeal, a savings provision keeps the old Code alive for offences committed before 1 July 2024, so cases from the earlier period are still tried under the IPC. The Code has ceased to govern anything done after that date, which is the sense in which it has been replaced. (Provisional — pending the official UPSC key.)

(a)1 only
(b)2 only
(c)Both 1 and 2
(d)Neither 1 nor 2

Answer

Why

Correct — C, Both 1 and 2. Statement 1 is the standard account of how the Indian Penal Code came to be written. The Charter Act of 1833 provided for a Law Commission, and the First Law Commission was constituted in 1834 with Thomas Babington Macaulay as its chairman. Its principal work was a draft penal code, prepared in the mid-1830s and submitted to the Governor-General in Council; the draft was then revised over two decades by later hands, notably Barnes Peacock, before the Code was passed on 6 October 1860 and brought into operation on 1 January 1862. The Code is dated 1860 because that is when it was enacted, not when it was written, so a statement that the First Law Commission recommended it is accurate. Statement 2 is also correct. The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 was passed by Parliament in December 2023, received assent on 25 December 2023 and came into effect on 1 July 2024; its repeal-and-savings clause repeals the Indian Penal Code, and it was brought in alongside the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, which replaced the Code of Criminal Procedure, and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, which replaced the Indian Evidence Act. One qualification belongs in the record: as with any repeal, a savings provision keeps the old Code alive for offences committed before 1 July 2024, so cases from the earlier period are still tried under the IPC. The Code has ceased to govern anything done after that date, which is the sense in which it has been replaced.

Why the others are wrong

(a)1 only — Gets the origin right but denies the replacement. The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita came into effect on 1 July 2024 and repealed the Indian Penal Code, so by the date of this paper the IPC was no longer the operative penal law.
(b)2 only — Accepts the replacement but denies the authorship. The Code was drafted on the recommendations of the First Law Commission of 1834, chaired by Macaulay — one of the best-attested facts in Indian legal history.
(d)Neither 1 nor 2 — Rejects both statements when both hold. There is no reading on which the First Law Commission is disconnected from the Penal Code, and none on which the IPC survived 1 July 2024 as the governing penal statute.

Concept

The Charter Act of 1833 created a single legislature for British India and provided for a Law Commission to examine and codify its laws. The First Law Commission, constituted in 1834 under Macaulay, produced the draft Penal Code that, after long revision, became the Indian Penal Code of 1860. That Code, with the Code of Criminal Procedure and the Indian Evidence Act, formed the frame of Indian criminal law for over a century and a half. It was replaced in 2023 by three new statutes — the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam — all of which came into effect on 1 July 2024.

Both halves of this question are dated, and dates are where students lose it. The IPC carries the year 1860 in its own title, so it is tempting to assume the commission that produced it also belongs to 1860 and to reject statement 1. The gap between drafting and enactment is the point: written in the 1830s, argued over for two decades, and passed in the aftermath of 1857, when the case for a uniform criminal law across British India had become urgent. The second statement is a current-affairs check with a fixed date, 1 July 2024, and by the April 2025 exam that change was ten months old. When a statement uses an absolute word like 'completely', pause and ask whether the absoluteness is doing real work. Here it is not: the repeal is total for the future, and the ordinary savings that keep old cases running under the old Code are a feature of every repeal rather than a survival of the IPC. Do not confuse the First Law Commission of 1834 with the present Law Commission of India, which is an executive body reconstituted from time to time and is not a constitutional or statutory one.

Key facts

The Charter Act of 1833 provided for a Law Commission; the First Law Commission was constituted in 1834 with Thomas Babington Macaulay as chairman.
The Indian Penal Code was drafted on that Commission's recommendations, passed on 6 October 1860 and brought into force on 1 January 1862.
The Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 received assent on 25 December 2023 and came into effect on 1 July 2024, repealing the Indian Penal Code.
The Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita replaced the Code of Criminal Procedure and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam replaced the Indian Evidence Act, both from the same date.
Offences committed before 1 July 2024 continue to be tried under the Indian Penal Code, under the ordinary savings that accompany a repeal.
The present Law Commission of India is a non-statutory executive body reconstituted by government order, quite distinct from the First Law Commission of 1834.

Study next

The Charter Act of 1833 and the beginnings of codification in British IndiaThe three new criminal laws of 2023 and what each replacedThe Second, Third and Fourth Law Commissions of the nineteenth century and the codes they producedThe Law Commission of India today — how it is constituted and the status of its reportsWarren Hastings and Cornwallis on judicial administration, the background against which codification became necessary

Common traps

Reading the year in the Code's title as the year it was drafted; the drafting was of the 1830s and the enactment of 1860.
Assuming a repealed statute vanishes entirely; savings provisions keep it applicable to offences committed before the repeal.
Confusing the First Law Commission of 1834 with the present Law Commission of India, which has no statutory or constitutional basis.

As a two-statement item like this one, as a direct question on who chaired the First Law Commission, or through the three criminal laws of 2023 and what each of them replaced.

Related PYQs

NDA_GAT_2021_II_Q902021Open & attempt →

Which of the following statements about the Law Commission headed by Lord Macaulay is/are correct? 1. It attempted to codify the laws. 2. It was opposed to uniform system of Courts. Select the correct answer using the code given below:

(a) 1 only
(b) 2 only
(c) Both 1 and 2
(d) Neither 1 nor 2

Answer(a) 1 only

The same commission on a paper with an official UPSC key. Its first statement — that the body under Macaulay set out to codify the law — is what makes this item's first statement true, and its second statement is rejected because codification and a uniform judicial structure were two halves of the same project rather than opposites.

Practice

practice — not a real PYQ
The Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 replaced which one of the following?
- (a)The Indian Penal Code, 1860
- (b)The Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973
- (c)The Indian Evidence Act, 1872
- (d)The Code of Civil Procedure, 1908
Answer(b) The Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 — the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita replaced the Penal Code and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam replaced the Evidence Act.
practice — not a real PYQ
Under which Act was the First Law Commission of India provided for?
- (a)The Regulating Act, 1773
- (b)The Pitt's India Act, 1784
- (c)The Charter Act, 1833
- (d)The Indian Councils Act, 1861
Answer(c) The Charter Act, 1833 — the Commission was constituted in 1834 under Macaulay and drafted the Penal Code.