Zero FIR

A Zero FIR is a First Information Report that a police station registers for a cognizable offence even though the crime occurred outside its own territorial jurisdiction. It is numbered '0' to mark that it originates outside the registering station's jurisdiction, and is then formally transferred to the police station that does have jurisdiction, which renumbers it and takes up investigation. The concept was not originally part of statute. It grew out of judicial direction and executive advisory, most influentially the recommendations of the Justice J.S. Verma Committee, constituted in 2013 after the December 2012 Delhi gang rape, which found that jurisdictional refusal was routinely costing victims the critical first hours after a crime. For decades a police station could lawfully turn away a complainant on the ground that the offence occurred elsewhere. The Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), 2023, which replaced the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973, gave Zero FIR its first explicit statutory footing. Section 173(1) allows information about a cognizable offence to be given orally, in writing, or electronically, at any police station, irrespective of the area where the offence was committed. Electronic information must be signed by the informant within three days as a safeguard against fabricated complaints, and a complainant whose station refuses registration may approach the Superintendent of Police under Section 175. States have since extended the concept technologically: Gujarat's 2026 Cyber Financial Fraud e-Zero FIR system auto-generates a Zero FIR the moment a victim reports fraud on the national cybercrime helpline 1930, without any visit to a police station.

• 1 Numbered '0' at the registering station; renumbered as a regular FIR after transfer to the jurisdictional station
• 2 Origin traced to the Justice J.S. Verma Committee, 2013, formed after the December 2012 Delhi gang rape
• 3 Now has explicit statutory backing under Section 173(1), BNSS, 2023, replacing reliance on precedent alone
• 4 Applies to cognizable offences; information may be given orally, in writing, or electronically
• 5 Electronic information must be signed by the informant within three days to be taken on record
• 6 Refusal by a station can be challenged before the Superintendent of Police under Section 175, BNSS
• 7 Gujarat's 2026 e-Zero FIR system automates the process for cyber-financial fraud via helpline 1930
• 8 Distinct from an e-FIR, which is any FIR registered through electronic communication once signed

In Gujarat's e-Zero FIR pilot, a complaint on the national cybercrime helpline 1930 automatically generates a Zero FIR electronically routed to the jurisdictional police station, saving the victim a trip to a station during the 'golden hour' after a fraud.