INTRODUCTION
If law were a city, statutes would be its buildings. But without a map of the street connecting them, navigating the system becomes a matter of guesswork.
India consists of one of the most complex legal systems in the world, comprising over 1500 central statutes and multiple state laws.[1] Typically, legal research and education approach statutes in isolation, through the black-letter methods. But in the real settings, laws rarely function alone. They constantly overlap, interact, and depend upon one another.
That’s when complex network theory provides a breakthrough. Emerging from mathematics and computer science, this theory carefully analyses systems as networks of interconnected nodes.[2]
WHAT IS COMPLEX NETWORK THEORY?
Network analysis theory refers to the study of systems that are made up of interconnected elements and relationships that link them together.[3] Instead of focusing on a particular aspect, it explores and examines how the structure of connections impacts the functioning of the whole system. When applying it to law, network analysis changes the angle from reading of statutes as solitary texts towards understanding them as nodes within the wider web of references, amendments, and judicial interpretations.
Nodes à entities (in Law, statutes, sections, or judgements)
Edgesà connections (citations, amendments, or interpretations)
This model helps us to measure:
Degree centrality à how many connections a law has. For instance, the Indian Penal Code,1860(IPC) (and now its successor, Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita,2023)[4] is widely referenced across the criminal statutes.[5]
Betweenness centrality à how often a law acts as a bridge. The Evidence Act, 1872(now replaced by the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023), links a substantial number of provisions to the criminal procedure.[6]
Cluster à the group of laws that appear together frequently, like environmental statutes.
Robustness à the resilience of the system if a key law is repealed or amended, such as the overhaul of the colonial criminal codes in 2023.[7]
WHY APPLY IT TO INDIAN LEGISLATION?
The Indian legal system is dense and layered. Most statutes don’t stand alone; they overlap, borrow from or directly link with each other. This makes it hard to study them in isolation. Network analysis offers a way to trace those links and see how the system fits together. One of the clearest examples of this interconnectedness can be seen in the very foundation of India’s criminal law.
THE CORE CRIMINAL LAW CLUSTER
The foundation of the Indian criminal law was based upon three central statutes: the Indian Penal Code, 1860(IPC), the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973(CrPC), and the Indian Evidence Act, 1872. These statutes were deeply interconnected with each other; the IPC defined offences, the CrPC laid down procedures of investigation and trial, and the Evidence Act dealt with the rules of evidence or proof. Together, these statutes formed the “heart” of the Indian criminal law.
With the 2023 reforms, this triangle has now been replaced by the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023(BNS), the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (BNSS), and the Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 (BSA). While the revised version changed the names, drafting style, and revised certain provisions, the dense interconnectedness between substantive law, procedure, and evidence remains intact.
EXPANDING THE NETWORK BEYOND CORE CRIMINAL LAW
Beyond the core criminal law cluster, newer laws have integrated their way into the legal framework. For instance, the Information Technology Act, 2000, connects with criminal law by defining cyber offences, aligning with the BNS, and also interacting with the BSA for the admissibility of electronic records.[8] Furthermore, the Prevention of Money Laundering Act 2002(PMLA) also links the financial offences to the already established offences under the BNS, thus reinforcing the centrality of substantive criminal law. This expanded perspective indicates how modern statues rarely operate in isolation. Instead, they relate to existing frameworks, forming a complex web of interdependencies. This integration of new laws into older clusters signifies how the legal system grows naturally, with each addition reshaping, rather than replacing, the existing network.
APPLICATIONS OF NETWORK ANALYSIS IN LAW
Network analysis is not just limited to the theory; it also has several practical implications for the functioning of legal systems. Some key areas where it can be applied include:
- Legislative Drafting
Network analysis can map interconnections, so that passing a new statute could avoid future overlaps. For example, the proposed Digital India Bill needs to be aligned with existing IT Act provisions.[9]
- Judicial Interpretation
The analysis can help the court in visualising how striking down a certain provision would affect connected laws. For instance, when the Supreme Court struck down Section 66A of the IT Act in the famous Shreya Singhal v. Union of India,[10] it not only invalidated a provision but also reshaped the connected free speech-cybercrime relationship.
- Policy Reform
It can highlight clusters of outdated statues. Replacing colonial codes with the BNS, BNSS, and BSA, 2023 rewires the criminal law network.[11]
- Legal Research and Education
Scholars and students could benefit from such visualisations that demonstrate how laws “talk to” one another or connect, rather than reading and understanding in isolation.
GLOBAL INSPIRATIONS
Various jurisprudences have been experimenting with legal network analysis, for example:
- In the United States, researchers mapped citation networks of the Supreme Court and federal statutes to estimate the influences.[12]
- In the European Union, legal scholars have visualised regulations and directives as per hierarchy into hierarchical webs.[13]
Although in India, computer scientists proposed LeSICiN(Legal Statute Identification Network), combining statute with network data to provide an enhanced case-statute mapping[14], it still lags in making this an open area for interdisciplinary innovations.
CHALLENGES AND LIMITATIONS
For all its promises, applying network analysis to Indian law comes with its own set of limitations :
- Technical Barrier: Indian legal frameworks still lag in digital development; many legal texts and statutes are only available in outdated portals or PDFs and are not machine-readable. This poses a challenge in the construction of a systematic legal network.
- Legal Concerns: Limiting or reducing complex interpretation into nodes and edges could risk oversimplification. Courts rely on set principles, context, and values that may not be fully captured by such algorithmic models.
- Institutional Gaps: There is only limited collaboration between legal scholars and data scientists in India. Without such multidisciplinary engagements.
CONCLUSION
The network theory helps us understand the Indian legal system not as a dispersed set of statutes, but as a big web of interdependent laws. By mapping statutes as nodes and their links as edges, we can identify legal clusters, which helps in highlighting outdated provisions, and predict unintended effects of reforms. Yet, India has yet to seriously adopt this approach—posing both a challenge and an opportunity.
To bridge this gap, we need-
- Legal safeguards, by embedding context and constitutional principles into network models.
- Institutional innovation, creation of interdisciplinary hubs connecting law, policy, and data science.
- Technical reforms, such as the nationwide digitisation of all central and state laws in machine-readable formats.
As India steps into the age of digital governance, we must stop treating laws as isolated texts. Network analysis offers a smarter, systemic way to understand and reform the law, leading to a future where insight lies not in thicker commentaries but in a more connected and intelligent map of our legal ecosystem.
Author(s) Name: Anayza Faiyaz (Barkatullah University, Bhopal)
References:
[1] Ministry of Law and Justice, Annual Report 2022–23 (Government of India 2023) https://doj.gov.in/annual-reports/ accessed 26 August 2025.
[2] lbert-László Barabási, Network Science (Cambridge University Press, 2016) < https://assets.cambridge.org/97811070/76266/frontmatter/9781107076266_frontmatter.pdf > accessed 26 August 2025.
[3] Mark Newman, Networks: An Introduction (Oxford University Press, 2010) <https://academic.oup.com/book/27303> accessed 26 August 2025.
[4] Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023
[5] Ratanlal & Dhirajlal, The Indian Penal Code (LexisNexis 2020).
[6] Lawrence M. Solan, The Language of Statutes: Laws and Their Interpretation (University of Chicago Press, 2010) < https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1728754 > accessed 26 August 2025.
[7] Lok Sabha Secretariat, Legislative Brief on Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, and Bharatiya Sakshya Adhiniyam, 2023 (PRS 2023) <https://prsindia.org/files/bills_acts/bills_parliament/2023/SC_Report_Bharatiya_Nyaya_Sanhita_2023.pdf > accessed 26 August 2025.
[8] Elonnai Hickok, Cybersecurity in India: A Legal and Policy Analysis (Centre for Internet and Society 2015) <https://cis-india.org/internet-governance/resources/cyber-security-in-india.pdf > accessed 27 August 2025.
[9] Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), Digital India Bill Consultation Paper (2023) <https://prsindia.org/files/bills_acts/bills_parliament/2023/Legislistive_Brief-Bharatiya_Nyaya_Sanhita_2023.pdf> accessed 27 August 2025.
[10] Shreya Singhal v Union of India AIR 2015 SC 1523.
[11] RS Legislative Research, ‘Bills Replacing IPC, CrPC and Evidence Act’ (PRS 2023) <https://prsindia.org/billtrack/prs-products/prs-legislative-brief-1702470430 > accessed 25 August 2025.
[12] James H Fowler and others, ‘Network Analysis and the Law: Measuring the Legal Importance of Precedents at the US Supreme Court’ (2007) 15 Political Analysis 324 < https://doi.org/10.1093/pan/mpm011> accessed 27 August 2025.
[13] Koniaris, Anagnostopoulos & Vassiliou, ‘Network Analysis in the Legal Domain: A Complex Model for European Union Legal Sources’ (2015) arXiv Preprint < https://arxiv.org/abs/1501.05237> accessed 27 August 2025.
[14] Priyanshu Agarwal and others, ‘LeSICiN: Legal Statute Identification Based on Citation Network’ (arXiv preprint, 2021) < https://arxiv.org/abs/2112.14731> accessed 27 August 2025.
