 bill no 176 of  2017 the code of criminal procedure (amendment) bill, 2017 byshri dushyant chautala, mpa billfurther to amend the code of criminal procedure, 1973be it enacted by parliament in the sixty-eighth year of the republic of  india as follows:—1  (1) this act may be called the code of  criminal procedure (amendment) act, 2017 statement of objects  and reasonswhen an information regarding the commission of cognizable offence, commonly known as first information report (fir), is given under section 154 of the code of criminal procedure, 1973 (cr pc), sub-section (2) of the same mandates the police authorities that a copy of such information should be supplied to the informant as well free of cost however, the code lacks any provision which bestows the same right upon an accused/suspect or his authorized representative in order to get the copy of fir after its registration with or without any costalthough section 207 of cr pc requires the concerned magistrate to furnish a copy of the fir to the accused but the provisions of section 207 come into play only after the filing of charge sheet under section 173 cr pc similarly, a combined reading of sub-sections (5) and (7) of section 173 of the cr pc also shows that after filing of the charge sheet, the police may also supply copy of the fir to the accused person along with other papers of the charge sheet however, the expression under sub-section (7) of section 173 cr pc "the police officer investigating the case finds it convenient so to do, he may furnish to the accused copies" also conveys a mere directory order to the investigative authorities to provide the copy of the fir to the accused or his representative, thereby again leaving discretion in their hands and the accused/suspect at their mercy on a plain reading of the statute, it is clear that the provisions of sections 207 and 173 of the cr pc are attracted only after filing of the charge sheet by the police there is no specific provision in the cr pc requiring the supply of the fir to the accused person or his authorized representative before the filing of the charge sheet and after the registration of firthe above lacuna in the statute, has led to various untoward circumstances where the police officials have summoned or in many cases even arrested the suspect/accused at the police station and kept them locked or bound within the police station on the pretense that there has been an fir filed against them, but seldom do they disclose the contents of that fir this leads to unnecessary harassment of the public and disproportionate allocation of power in the hands of the investigative agency leading to corruption and persecutionthere are several judgment of various high courts holding that fir is a "public document" within the meaning of section 74 of the evidence act, 1872 therefore, as required under the provisions of section 76 of the that act, certified copy of the fir has to be given to the accused person on his request on payment of the applicable legal fees by every public officer (such as the officer in charge of the police station) having the custody of such document in this regard, there is decision of the allahabad high court in shyam lal vs state of up, 1998 cri lj 2879 which said that " first information report is a public document and any person is entitled to have its certified copy either from the police authorities and/or from any court where it is lying if a person files an application and prepared to pay the proper court fee in such an event no authority can refuse supplying the certified copy of the first information report" and other similar judgments from the high courts of different states like decision of the karnataka high court in chnnappa andanappa siddareddy vs state, 1980 crl lj 1022; decision of the bombay high court in mohammed khalid shaikh v state of maharashtra [criminal application no 709 of 2010 decided on 4 march 2010]; decision of the delhi high court in court on its own motion through mr ajay choudhary vs state [wp (crl) no 468/2010 decided on 6 december 2010]however, no such provision has been provided explicitly in any statute and there is no decision of the supreme court available completely adjudicating on this issue leading to a divided opinion of various investigative agencies and lower courts in different states adding upto the adversities of an accused moreover even if the high court of a certain state has provided a judgment  in favour of such issue, execution of such judgment without any written provision becomes a difficult task for the common public especially those who are poor and illiterate if the police authorities and lower courts do not provide them any assistance this is again leaving the common man at the mercy of the authorities adding to his woes moreover the payment of required legal fees under section 76 of the indian evidence act, 1872, further acts as a burden to an accused or his authorized representative who cannot afford to pay such fees in the present scenario, the only option which is available with the accused or his authorized representative to get a copy of fir is either to bribe the police officials in order to get a copy or pay some fees (bribe) to the staff working in the court of magistrate therefore, such a change in the justice system is the demand of the time to also bring the much needed "transparency in administration of criminal justice"recently the supreme court, in a judgment arising out of public interest litigation filed by the uttarakhand based youth bar association of india on the same issue, has accepted the fact that "it is vitally necessary that an accused person should be granted a copy of the first information at the earliest possible state in order that he may get the benefit of legal advice" and directed all the states to upload the firs on the official police websites of different states within 24 hours of their registration but again the execution of such direction in different states is yet to be followed especially in small and poor states who hardly have the staff and resources moreover, in a country where majority of the population is illiterate and poor, the availability of firs online hardly seems to be a workable solution since it won't be accessible to all and therefore requires a statutory provisionaccording to a news report carried on by the national social watch, a network of civil society organization in 2013, about three fourths of the total prisoners in indian prisons are under-trials and according to the national crime records bureau report for 2015, the occupancy rate at the all india level in indian prisons at the end of 2015 was 1144 per cent and almost seventy per cent of the convicts were illiterate in a scenario like this it is clear that majority of the prison inmates have no clue as to why they are in the prisons and they have been languishing in there for years, some of them even convicted, without even knowing and understanding the charges against them which goes against the spirit of fundamental rights of the accusedin 1997, a judgment in the case of dk basu vs state of west bengal changed the course of indian criminal justice system by providing certain basic rights to the accused so that they are not tormented by the system and this bill aims to seek the same remarkable feat by allowing the accused or his authorized representative access to fir on demand as a right which is a valuable document in respect of information not just for the complainant but for the accused as well since it allows him to prepare for a more informed defence which is essential for a fair trialindia being a developing country, majority of its population still consist of people who are illiterate and poor in case, if any such common man is accused of a crime and is deprived of the basic and document fir which would inform him of what he has been accused of and prepare him for the upcoming actions, it amounts to a clear victimization of the common man at the hands of the justice system and leads to violate the human rights of an accusedin order to improve the above mentioned conditions, we need to rectify and accommodate the term 'fir' with due precision in section 154(2) of cr pc which adherently gives right to the accused or his authorized representative to get a copy of fir on demand without any delay and before the stage of filing the charge sheet which will make the due process of law easier and fairer even on behalf of the accusedhence this billnew delhi;dushyant chautalajuly 07,  2017 annexure extracts from the code of criminal procedure, 1973 (act no 2 of 1974)    154 (1)     information in cognizable cases(2) a copy of the information as recorded under sub-section (1) shall be given forthwith, free of cost, to the informant(3)      lok  sabha———— a billfurther to amend the code of  criminal procedure, 1973————(shri dushyant chautala, mp)gmgipmrnd—2140ls(s3)—13-10-2017