Mumbai: Cops can be booked for failing to register FIRs in cognizable offences

An officer said as per the order issued by Pandey, an FIR can made out against police officers not registering FIRs under Section 166 C of the India Penal Code. The Act says, “Whoever being a public servant fails to record any information given to him under sub-section (1) of section 154 of the Code of Criminal Procedure…in relation to cognizable offence..shall be punished with rigorous imprisonment for a term which shall not be less than six months but which may extend to two years.”

The officer said as per the order, in case a complaint approached the Commissioner regarding non-registration of FIR at the police station, the Commissioner will look into the complaint. If the senior official finds that a cognizable offence was made out yet the FIR was not registered, an FIR will be registered in the case. In addition, an FIR will be registered against the concerned police officer who did not register an FIR in the case.

The officer added that after Pandey shared his mobile number with the public, he started receiving several complaints about police not registering FIRs. “Following this, the Commissioner issued this order in order to ensure that people are not made to run around for registration of FIRs,” the official said.

The number of FIRs that have been registered ever since Pandey took over has been more than those registered earlier. “In most cases it involves cyber offences in which officers did not register FIRs since the detection rate in such cases is poor and can pull down their overall detection rate. But for the past few months, even in cyber crime cases where a large amount of money was not stolen, FIRs have been registered by the police,” the official added.