Though there is a statutory law that a case should be registered within 24 hours of receipt of an FIR and there is even provision of online registration, but these rules are thrown to the wind here.
The apathy of the police makes it pretty clear in a theft case on November 17 night where the miscreants had decamped with cash of Rs 50,000 by breaking open the lock of the backside shutter of a grocery shop owned by Tata Sponge Employees Consumers Cooperative situated at Bilaipada under Joda police station.
Sources said Ramesh Chandra Sahu, a co-partner of the grocery shop, had filed an FIR in the Bilepada beat house and submitted the same in the Joda police station after the theft case came to his notice on November 18. However, the police did not file a case basing on the FIR.
Consequently, five days after the incident, the complainant along with another co-partner Surjit Kumar Singh met Keonjhar SP JN Pankaj.
Now it is being discussed in the Joda town as to why police are inactive and what lobby was working to force police to dillydally over the matter.
When contracted, Beat house in charge Naresh Kumar Das attributed the reason for delay to shortage of police personnel. However, police sources claimed that the case was registered only on Thursday.