FIRST INFORMATION REPORT DISHA GUPTA BASICS OF LAW Thu, Oct 03, 2019, at ,11:13 AM INTRODUCTION An FIR (First Information Report) is the earliest form and the first information of a cognizable offence recorded by an officer-in-charge of a police station. An offence in which the police officer has the supreme authority of arresting without a warrant and to be able to start an investigation with or without the permission of the court is termed as a cognizable offence. Section 154 of the Code of Criminal Procedure deals with what is commonly known as a First Information Report. It provides that all the information relating to the commission of a cognizable offence, if given orally to an officer-in-charge of a Police Station, must be reduced in writing by him, and read over to the informant. He need not enter each one of the information in the station house diary and this is implied in section 154 CrPC. Apart from a vague information by a phone call, the information first entered in the station house diary, kept for this purpose, by a police officer-in-charge of a police station is the first information report- FIR postulated by section 154 CrPC. All other information made orally or in writing after the commencement of the investigation into the cognizable offence disclosed from the facts mentioned in the first information report and entered in the station house diary by the police officer or such other cognizable offences as may come to his notice during the investigation, will be statements falling under section 162 CrPC. No such information/statement can properly be treated as an FIR and entered in the station house diary again, as it would in effect be a second FIR and the same cannot be in conformity with the scheme of CrPC. Click Here to Get Magazine for Preparation of PCS J and Other Competitive Exams ESSENTIALS OF F.I.R The essential conditions to be known while reporting/recording information are: It should be the information of fact disclosing the commission of a cognizable offence. It should not be vague or indefinite. It may be given by anybody. It is not necessary that the offender or the witnesses should be named. WHO CAN LODGE F.I.R FIR can be filed by the following persons: By an aggrieved person or somebody on his behalf. Any person who is aware of the offence by being either: An eye witness and/or Hearsay account. By the accused himself. By the SHO on his own knowledge or information even when a cognizable offence is committed in view of an officer in charge he can register a case himself however he is not bound to take down in writing any information and even if the information is only by a medical certificate upon arrival of the injured, then the (SHO) should enter it in daily diary and go to hospital for recording detailed statement of injured. EVIDENTIARY VALUE OF F.I.R FIR not being a substantive piece of evidence can be used in the following ways- Used for Corroboration purposes. For contradicting purposes the evidence of person giving the information is important. As an admission against the informer. To refresh the former’s memory. To impeaching the credit of an informer. To prove the informer’s conduct. In order to establish the identity of accused, witnesses & for fixing spot time as relevant facts. PUNISHMENT FOR GIVING FALSE F.I.R Punishment for giving false information to the Police is dealt with by Sections 182, 203 and 211 of the I.P.C. Even if such information is not reduced to writing under S. 154, the person giving the false information may nevertheless be punished for preferring a false charge under S. 211 of the I.P.C. Click Here to Get All Important Judgment of the Month IMPORTANT JUDGEMENTS Joginder Singh v. State of Punjab, (1980) 1 SCC 439- In a case decided by the Supreme Court, the incident in question had taken place around 2 p.m. and the Report has lodged at a Police Station 13 miles away at about 4-15 p.m. on the same day. Considering the facts and circumstances of the case, the Court held that there was no appreciable delay in lodging the F.I.R. Sher Singh v. State of Punjab, (1979) 3 SCC 606- In this case, the Supreme Court, there was an attempt to murder a girl by her father and her uncle. The victim and her mother were so shocked that they could not take any intelligent decision, and the F.I.R. was lodged about 30 hours after the incident. Taking the circumstances of the case into account, the Court held that such a delay was not fatal to the proceedings. K.C. Mangal v. State of Rajasthan, 1983 Cr. L.J.1- The Supreme Court has opined that the non-mention of the name of the accused in the F.I.R does not invalidate the F.I.R.