Yes, FIR is lodged by any person who knows about the commission of a cognizable offence. It is not necessary that only the victim of a crime or his relative can lodge such FIR. Any person who knows about such crime, can inform the police and get the FIR lodged. This is a basic principle of criminal law and any person having knowledge of an offence can set the criminal law in motion. In fact, Section 39 of the Cr.P.C. makes it a duty of every person to inform the nearest police officer or Magistrate about commission of certain serious offences.
FIR (or the First Information Report) is registered by police under Section 154 of the Criminal Procedure Code (Cr.P.C.). It is registered in respect of information relating to commission of a cognizable offence. The person who gives information for registration of FIR is called the “informant”, as is seen from sub-section (2) of Section 154 Cr.P.C., which says that: “A copy of the information as recorded under sub-section (1) shall be given forthwith, free of cost, to the informant”. There are no qualifying words attached to “informant” in Section 154 Cr.P.C. and it can be any person.
It may be pointed out that in the case of Ganesha v. Sharanappa, (2014) 1 SCC 87, the Supreme Court has differentiated between the words “informant” and “complainant”, by observing as under:
“…we may observe a common error creeping in many of the judgments including the present one. No distinction is made while using the words “informant” and “complainant”. In many of the judgments, the person giving the report under Section 154 of the Code is described as the “complainant” or the “de facto complainant” instead of “informant”, assuming that the State is the complainant. These are not words of literature. In a case registered under Section 154 of the Code, the State is the prosecutor and the person whose information is the cause for lodging the report is the informant. This is obvious from sub-section (2) of Section 154 of the Code which, inter alia, provides for giving a copy of the information to the “informant” and not to the “complainant”. However the complainant is the person who lodges the complaint. The word “complaint” is defined under Section 2(d) of the Code to mean any allegation made orally or in writing to a Magistrate and the person who makes the allegation is the complainant, which would be evident from Section 200 of the Code, which provides for examination of the complainant in a complaint case. Therefore, these words carry different meanings and are not interchangeable. In short, the person giving information, which leads to lodging of the report under Section 154 of the Code is the informant and the person who files the complaint is the complainant.”
Section 154 Cr.P.C. uses the word “informant” (and NOT “complainant”), and any person can give the “information” to police for the purposes of setting the criminal law in motion by way of getting the FIR registered.
Dr. Ashok Dhamija is a New Delhi based Supreme Court Advocate and author of law books. Read more about him by clicking here. List of his Forum Replies. List of his other articles. List of his Quora Answers. List of his YouTube Videos.
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