Organised Crime in India: Sentencing Inconsistencies and Evidentiary Complexities in Contemporary Criminal Jurisprudence

Organised crime in India has evolved beyond traditional offences such as smuggling, extortion, illicit trade, and bootlegging into complex, criminal enterprises operating across cyber, financial, and violent crime domains. Organised criminal groups are progressively leveraging artificial intelligence for fraud, impersonation, and concealment, an emerging threat not yet adequately addressed by existing statutory frameworks. Despite the presence of specialised legislations such as the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act, 1999 (MCOCA), the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 (UAPA), the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA), and the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, Indian criminal jurisprudence continues to face challenges relating to evidentiary thresholds and sentencing consistency. The continued lack of a uniform definition of organised crime across statutes, along with substantial reliance on circumstantial evidence, has led to divergent sentencing outcomes. These inconsistencies raise constitutional concerns under Articles 14 and 21 of the Indian Constitution. This paper undertakes a doctrinal analysis of statutory frameworks and judicial precedents to demonstrate that sentencing disparity in organised crime cases is structural rather than incidental. It further proposes a reform-oriented framework emphasising proportionality, evidentiary clarity, and structured sentencing guidelines.