PRINCIPLE OF LEGALITY (NULLA POENA SINE LEGE)
AUTHOR – KEERTHANA PREETHI A, STUDENT AT SCHOOL OF EXCELLENCE IN LAW (SOEL), THE TAMILNADU DR. AMBEDKAR LAW UNIVERSITY
BEST CITATION – KEERTHANA PREETHI A, PRINCIPLE OF LEGALITY (NULLA POENA SINE LEGE), INDIAN JOURNAL OF LEGAL REVIEW (IJLR), 5 (14) OF 2025, PG. 895-821, APIS – 3920 – 0001 & ISSN – 2583-2344.
ABSTRACT
A fundamental safeguard in modern criminal justice systems is the legality principle, which is embodied in the Latin maxim “nullum crimen sine lege”, “nulla poena sine lege” (no crime, no punishment without law). It forbids retroactive criminalization and mandates that punishable behavior be precisely defined before it is committed. This principle maintains the rule of law by subordinating official authority to pre-existing legal restrictions, guarantees fair notice so that citizens can anticipate the legal implications of their actions, and safeguards individual liberty against arbitrary governmental power. Through comparative jurisprudential analysis across five major legal systems, this article thoroughly examines the concept of legality: India (constitutional embodiment in Article 20(1), statutory manifestations, and Supreme Court interpretation); the United States (constitutional foundations in ex post-facto clause and due process, limited international application, pragmatic approach favoring prosecutorial flexibility), Russia (post-Soviet constitutional adoption amid conflict with state power and security imperatives), the United Kingdom (evolutionary common law development from rule of law principle, ECHR Article 7 integration, parliamentary supremacy constraints), and France (civil law origins, Code Pénal codification, European Court of Human Rights alignment). Different approaches reflecting different legal traditions (constitutional versus common law versus civil law), institutional arrangements (legislative versus judicial power allocation), and political contexts (liberal democracies versus post-authoritarian transitions versus security-state configurations) are revealed by the comparative analysis. The article shows how the principle functions differently in different jurisdictions despite apparent similarities in maxim articulation: some provide almost complete protection against retroactive criminalization (India, France, UK); others allow more state flexibility in defining criminal liability (US); still others manage conflict between legality principles and state security claims (Russia).
Keywords: principle of legality, nullum crimen sine lege, comparative criminal law, rule of law, international human rights, etc.