Police manual
The DigiFIR police app is the phone app of a police station. It holds the complaints that reach the front desk, the FIRs registered from them, each case's diary, evidence and time limits, and the station's own registers. Every decision an officer takes is signed with the officer's phone key and recorded on the ledger.
Who uses it
The app shows each officer only what their roles allow. The roles come from the officer's enrolment, not from the app.
| Role | Sees | Does |
|---|---|---|
| Station house officer (SHO) | Complaints, every case of the station, the station diary | Everything the duty officer does, plus: requests preliminary enquiries, assigns investigating officers, closes enquiries, replies to the court, keeps the station's supervisor, transfer stations and duty rosters |
| Duty officer | Complaints, the station's cases, the station diary | Decides the legal route of each complaint: FIR, Zero FIR, NCR, or a referral to a magistrate |
| Investigating officer (IO) | Only the cases assigned to them | Case diary, statements, evidence, arrest, remand, release, final report |
| Malkhana in-charge | Parcels offered to the malkhana and what it holds | Takes parcels into the malkhana and hands them out |
| Supervising officer (DSP or ACP and above) | The CCTNS check of the stations they supervise | Approves preliminary enquiries; ends the sessions of an officer whose phone is lost |
The state's registrar uses the same app with a separate Registrar section. See the registrar manual.
Set up your phone
You enrol your phone once, in person, with your registrar. There is no password and no OTP.
- Install the app and open it. Type your service ID as it is on your service record.
- Allow phone and SMS access, and choose your official SIM. The app sends one SMS from it. The network confirms which number sent it, and the registrar sees whether it matches your service record.
- Check your details on Is this you? and tap Yes, this is me. If they are not yours, tap This is not me: the enrolment is dropped and the registrar is told.
- The phone makes its key and shows a QR code, an 8-character code and a 16-character key code. Take the phone to your registrar.
- The registrar scans the code from your phone, checks you and your identity card, and approves your roles, designation and station.
- Read what the registrar approved on your phone. If it is right, confirm it. If it is wrong, ask the registrar to correct it before you confirm.
- The registrar signs the registration. Your phone shows that it is registered on the ledger.
- Set a six-digit app PIN.
CAUTION
Keep the official SIM in the phone. If it is taken out, switched off or replaced, the app locks with "Official SIM not found" until the SIM is back. The SIM check works only on Android.
The screens
| Tab | What is there |
|---|---|
| Home | Time limits at a glance, what needs your action, notifications |
| Complaints | New complaints at the front desk (not shown to an IO) |
| Cases (My cases for an IO) | The station's cases, or the IO's own |
| Malkhana | For the malkhana in-charge: parcels waiting and the register |
| Profile | Station diary, court diary, malkhana register, beat map, duty roster, leave, checks, Show my ID, app lock settings |
Decide a complaint
A complaint filed in the citizen app arrives as an e-complaint under the citizen's own complaint number. Walk-in complaints are taken in at the desk.
- Open Complaints and tap a complaint. It shows how it arrived (citizen app, walk-in or agent), whether the informant's identity and mobile are verified, and whether the informant has signed it.
- Read the suggested route, for example Register an FIR under BNSS s.173(1).
- Choose what to do:
| Choice | When | Button |
|---|---|---|
| Register an FIR | A cognizable offence in this station's area | Check and register FIR |
| Register a Zero FIR and transfer it | A cognizable offence outside this station's area | Register and transfer |
| Preliminary enquiry | Offences punishable with 3 years or more but less than 7; needs the supervising officer's approval; 14 days | Start preliminary enquiry |
| Non-cognizable report | No cognizable offence | Record NCR |
| Ask the informant | Details are missing | Ask for details |
| Remind to sign | The informant has not signed the e-complaint | Remind to sign |
IMPORTANT
An e-complaint must be signed by the informant within three days (BNSS s.173(1)(ii)), by Aadhaar eSign or at the station. The ledger refuses to register an FIR on an unsigned complaint.
A complaint recorded as an NCR can still become an FIR later on the same complaint.
Verify a citizen at the desk
A citizen without DigiLocker can come to the station with an 8-character code from their app or the portal. Look the code up in the police app, check the person and their identity card (Aadhaar, voter ID, passport, driving licence or another photo ID), record how you established who they are, and confirm. The citizen's app then signs them in.
Register an FIR
- Tap Check and register FIR.
- Check the BNS sections. They are suggested from the statement; tap to change them. The full table of sections is available.
- Tick the two confirmations: I have read the full complaint (or, for a walk-in, Read over to the informant, who signed it) and Recorded exactly as the informant gave it.
- Choose whether to Publish on the police website. For BNS sections 64 to 71 this stays off: nothing that may identify the victim may be published (BNS s.72).
- If you already have it, type the CCTNS FIR number. CCTNS stays the legal FIR register; the number can also be linked later.
- Look at the duplicate check. Records that look like the complaint are shown with how close they are. Choose one:
- Register the FIR if it is a new incident;
- Register and send for review if it may repeat another FIR. The FIR is registered and a magistrate looks at the pair, and investigation can start now;
- Keep for the magistrate if it is the same incident. No FIR is registered now. The complaint is kept in full and sent to a magistrate, who decides.
- Tap Register FIR.
The app shows the FIR number from the ledger and the block it was recorded in, and adds a station diary entry. Tap Open case or Next complaint.
NOTE
Information is never refused. A probable duplicate goes to a magistrate; it is never turned away at the desk.
Zero FIR
For an offence outside your station's area, tap Register Zero FIR and transfer. The receiving station is suggested from the place of occurrence. Tap Register and transfer. If the receiving station is in another state, the SHO signs the Zero FIR: the SHO's phone reads the case's private details and hands them over, so the receiving state can open the case.
Work a case
Open Cases and tap a case. The case shows its time limits, which count down:
| Time limit | Basis |
|---|---|
| Produce an arrested person before a magistrate within 24 hours | BNSS s.58 |
| Chargesheet before default bail, 60 or 90 days from the first remand | BNSS s.187(3) |
| Two months to complete the investigation, for the offences listed | BNSS s.193(2) |
| Progress update to the informant within 90 days | BNSS s.193(3)(ii) |
The SHO first taps Assign officer to choose the investigating officer. The IO then uses More on the case:
| Action | What to do |
|---|---|
| Add diary entry | Type or speak the entry. Choose whether to share it with the informant. Entries are numbered and chained on the ledger; nothing can be removed (BNSS s.192). |
| Record statement | Record a witness's or victim's statement, in writing or on video (BNSS s.180). A woman officer records the statement of a woman victim of a sexual offence. |
| Record evidence | Film the search and seizure on the phone (BNSS s.105), up to 2 GiB, add the register heading and the witnesses of the seizure memo, then tap Seal and add. The video is encrypted on the phone and uploaded in parts; a paused upload continues from where it stopped. |
| Record arrest | Tick each safeguard first: grounds told, relative informed, arrest memo signed (BNSS s.36, s.47, s.48). The 24-hour clock starts. |
| Record remand | After production, record the magistrate's order: judicial or police custody. |
| Release | Record a release on police bail for a bailable offence, a release with no grounds to forward (BNSS s.189), or a court's bail order. |
| Send progress update | Send the informant the update BNSS s.193(3)(ii) requires. |
| File final report | Choose Chargesheet or Closure report, attach the report (PDF), check the court, accused and charged sections, and tap File report. |
CAUTION
An arrest's custody record holds up to 200 entries, of which police records can fill 180. The app warns you before signing when the record is full. The court's orders and the release can always still be added.
Send evidence to the laboratory
- On the exhibit, tap Put it in the malkhana. The parcel stays in your custody until the malkhana in-charge takes it over.
- The malkhana in-charge checks the parcel, its label and its seal, and taps Take it into the malkhana.
- Tap Send to a laboratory. Choose the laboratory and division, and write the forwarding letter and your question to the laboratory. The letter is readable only by the laboratory.
- The officer taking the parcel signs for it from the malkhana and, at the laboratory, taps Hand over at the laboratory counter.
- When the laboratory accepts the parcel, tap Give the laboratory the keys so it can open the evidence files.
- After the report is sealed, the laboratory offers the parcel back. Take it over in the app.
If the laboratory refuses a parcel, the app shows why (for example, the seal is broken or it went to the wrong laboratory), and it can be sent again.
Station tools
These are in Profile.
| Tool | What it holds |
|---|---|
| Station diary | The general diary, live as any officer writes it. Each day is closed at midnight and its digest is anchored on the ledger. |
| Checks | Vehicle, person, stolen phone IMEI and missing person checks. Every check is logged against the officer who made it. |
| Court diary | Hearings, with reminders |
| Malkhana register | What the malkhana holds |
| Beat map | Hotspots and patrol |
| Duty roster and Leave | The roster as the station sets it, and leave applied for and decided in the app |
| Show my ID | A police ID with a QR code signed by your phone key every 30 seconds, which a citizen can check in the DigiFIR app |
Working with a weak signal
Diary entries, statements, arrests and remands are signed on the phone and kept in an encrypted outbox marked "Saved on phone". They are sent in order when the signal returns, for up to 7 days.
App lock and security
- The app asks for your PIN at every start and after the auto-lock time away (1, 5 or 15 minutes; 5 by default). See App lock.
- After the fifth wrong PIN, the phone is signed out and forgets its key, and you enrol again with the registrar in person.
- Real builds block screenshots of case data.
- Before you sign, the app shows what the action will record. Text over a limit is refused before signing, never cut.
Try it without a backend
The app runs in demo mode with a sample station: verify SIM 1 (SIM 2 shows the personal-SIM refusal), then set any PIN that is not too easy. Demo switches in Profile show the other roles, no signal, a removed SIM and CCTNS down. Demo and test data has the samples.
Sources: digifir-police-app on the migration branch: README.md, docs/04-sim-binding.md, docs/02-run-the-app.md, docs/app-lock.md, docs/legal-references.md, assets/i18n/en.json.