Legal provisions and significance of General Diary and First Information Report I NISSMAT Podcast

What this session covered

This session took the form of a host interviewing a single guest — a retired senior Delhi Police officer, now a practising advocate — on the distinction between the General Diary (GD) entry and the First Information Report (FIR). The speaker described the General Diary, also known as the daily diary, as the police station's chronological, time-stamped record maintained by the duty officer, covering control-room calls, incident information and the departure and arrival entries of police personnel. The FIR, by contrast — governed earlier by Section 154 of the Code of Criminal Procedure and now by Section 173 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita — is registered only where a cognizable offence is disclosed and sets investigation in motion, with non-cognizable matters recorded instead as non-cognizable reports. The speaker explained how information may first be entered in the GD pending inquiry and converted into an FIR only if a cognizable offence emerges, and how, in Delhi practice, murder cases are investigated by officers of inspector rank or above.

The discussion then turned to citizens' remedies when police decline to register an FIR: escalation to senior officers, and thereafter an application to the area magistrate under Section 156(3) of the CrPC, who may direct registration or instead record the complainant's evidence before summoning the accused. The speaker outlined the Zero FIR, which may be lodged at any police station irrespective of jurisdiction and is then transferred to the station concerned, as well as the provision for online FIR registration under the new code. He noted that any person with knowledge of a cognizable offence — not only the victim — may lodge an FIR, and that GD entries are not public documents but can form part of the charge sheet, with officers' departure and arrival entries capable of corroborating or falsifying a claimed movement during investigation.

The closing portion covered the compounding of offences before the trial court as against the quashing of an FIR, which lies with the High Court, typically on mutual settlement or where a civil dispute has been given a criminal colour; the cancellation of falsely registered FIRs and prosecution of the complainant under Section 182 of the Indian Penal Code on the magistrate's direction; grievance redressal against police misconduct through the supervisory hierarchy and vigilance branches; and the progress of digitisation of FIRs, general diaries, case diaries and station records, including the Supreme Court's direction that FIRs be uploaded to police websites subject to exceptions for certain categories of cases. The speaker ended by urging citizens to approach the police without fear and police officers to treat complainants and victims with courtesy.

Key points raised

• A General Diary entry is the police station's time-sequenced record of all information received, while an FIR — formerly under Section 154 CrPC, now Section 173 BNSS — is registered only for cognizable offences and triggers investigation; non-cognizable matters are recorded as NCRs.
• If police decline to register an FIR for a cognizable offence, the complainant may escalate to senior officers and then apply to the magistrate under Section 156(3) CrPC, who can direct registration or record pre-summoning evidence and proceed on the complaint directly.
• A Zero FIR can be lodged at any police station irrespective of jurisdiction and is transferred to the station where the offence occurred; the BNSS also provides for online FIR registration, with the complainant signing the report at the police station within 72 hours.
• Any person with knowledge of a cognizable offence — not only the victim or their family — may lodge an FIR.
• GD entries, including officers' departure and arrival records, can form part of the charge sheet and be used at trial to test the police account; they are not public documents, though access may be sought under RTI subject to exemptions for pending investigation or trial.
• An FIR found to rest on false information can be closed by the investigating officer's cancellation report, with prosecution of the complainant under Section 182 IPC on the magistrate's direction; quashing of an FIR is a matter for the High Court alone.