Police can’t refuse to register FIR, asserts Supreme Court

Date:25/07/2007 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2007/07/25/stories/2007072557300100.htm
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Police can’t refuse to register FIR, asserts Supreme Court

Legal Correspondent


‘It is a sorry state of affairs in country where police officers are totally corrupt’





NEW DELHI: Taking a serious view of non-registration of First Information Report (FIR) when complaints are lodged, the Supreme Court on Tuesday asked the States to issue instructions to the police to register an FIR on receipt of a complaint failing which the police officer concerned would be suspended.

A Bench of Justice B. N. Agrawal and Justice P. P. Naolekar observed, “Non-registration of FIR is happening at least in Bihar and Orissa, if not in the rest of the country. It is a sorry state of affairs in the country where police officers are totally corrupt.

They don’t register FIR. They are bound to register FIR but they don’t do that. We have seen in today’s newspapers how [45] bikers went round Connaught Place [in Delhi] and the police failed to register a case against them. What were they doing when the bikers roamed about in the city? What is happening here and how the police are behaving in this city we all know.”

The Bench was dismissing, at the admission stage, a special leave petition filed by S. Vandana against a Madras High Court order directing Chennai’s Police Commissioner to register an FIR against Ms. Vandana on a complaint of “trespass” filed by T. Krishanamachari, father of actor T. Srikanth.

The Bench told counsel K. K. Mani, “The Chennai police have no business to refuse registration of FIR. There is no justification for them to verify and investigate the complaint before registration of FIR. They have no business to undertake such an investigation and under what law they can do that?”

When counsel said that the High Court could not direct registration of FIR exercising its jurisdiction under Section 482 Cr.P.C., the Bench said, “If police don’t register FIR, what else the High Court can do? If police don’t register FIR, it is dereliction of duty and such police officers should be suspended.”

Citing his own experience, Justice Agrawal said, “When my wife and daughter-in-law went [to a police station] to lodge a complaint, it took two to three hours for the police to register an FIR. If this could happen to a Supreme Court judge, imagine what will happen to others!”