Section 3 of the Probation of Offenders Act, 1958 (release after due admonition) can be applied to a…

Section 3 covers (i) the offences it names, now ss.303(2), 305(a), 306, 315 and 318(4) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (formerly ss.379, 380, 381, 404 and 420 of the Indian Penal Code): theft, theft in a dwelling house, theft by a clerk or servant, dishonest misappropriation of a deceased person's property, and cheating with dishonest inducement to deliver property; and (ii) any offence under the BNS or any other law punishable with imprisonment for not more than two years, or with fine, or with both, where no previous conviction is proved. The named offences can carry up to three or seven years, so the two-year limit does not exclude them; the Act sets no monetary threshold for fine-only offences, and offences punishable with life imprisonment, ten years or more than seven years fall outside s.3.