Begin with what the Sanhita actually promises, because the gap between that and a completed case is where most of the frustration sits. The Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 says that every investigation shall be completed without unnecessary delay. It requires the investigating officer to inform the progress of the investigation, by any means including electronic communication, to the informant or the victim within a period of ninety days. It requires him to communicate the action taken to the person who first gave the information. For the specified sexual offences it fixes a two month outer limit for completing the investigation. Where an officer in charge forms the view that there is no sufficient ground to enter on an investigation at all, he must state the reasons in his report, forward the daily diary fortnightly to the magistrate, and forthwith notify the informant.
Read together, those give you a right to be told, and a small number of hard time limits in specific categories. What they do not give you is a general right to have an ordinary case finished within a fixed period. Any advice that suggests otherwise is setting you up for disappointment.
The lever that actually works
The effective remedy is judicial supervision, and it is obtained by an application to the magistrate. A magistrate empowered to take cognizance may, after considering an application supported by an affidavit made under the escalation provision, and after making such inquiry as he thinks necessary and considering the submission of the police officer, order an investigation. The Supreme Court held in December 2007 that a magistrate has ample power to direct a proper investigation, and that is the jurisdiction most complainants should be using instead of writing further letters. Note the two conditions built into the provision: the escalation to the Superintendent of Police has to have been made, and the application has to be supported by an affidavit.
Use it that way. Send a short written request at the ninety day mark asking for the progress information the Sanhita requires, addressed to the investigating officer and copied to the Deputy Commissioner of Police or Superintendent of Police, by email and registered post. The reply, or the absence of one, is the document you annex to the application before the magistrate. It converts a general complaint of inaction into a specific breach with a date on it.
The escalation ladder
- The investigating officer, in writing. A short letter asking what steps have been taken, what remains, and by when. Keep it factual.
- The Deputy Commissioner of Police or Superintendent of Police. Attach the earlier letter and the acknowledgement. Ask for the case to be reviewed or reassigned.
- The magistrate. An application supported by an affidavit seeking a direction for investigation. This is the step with legal force behind it.
- The High Court of Karnataka. Available where the statutory routes have been exhausted or where the offence is grave, and our guide on how a writ petition is filed in the High Court sets out the practicalities. Courts are cautious about supervising investigations and prefer that the magistrate be moved first.
- Parallel bodies where the officer's conduct is the problem. A departmental complaint and, where a human rights violation is alleged, the State Human Rights Commission, remembering its one year limit.
When the file comes back as a closure
Inaction sometimes ends in a closure report rather than in nothing at all. That is not the end. The magistrate is not bound to accept a closure report, the informant is entitled to notice, and a protest petition is the instrument for objecting. Our guide on the B report and how a closure is opposed in Karnataka sets out how that is done and what the magistrate can do with it, including taking cognizance despite the report. Knowing this in advance should change how you build the file from day one, because everything you place on record early is what the magistrate reads at that stage.
What makes these applications succeed
In practice the difference between an application that gets an order and one that does not is documentary. Annex the first information report or the non-cognizable entry, every letter you sent with proof of dispatch, the reply or the absence of one, and a short chronology on one page. State what specific step has not been taken: a statement not recorded, call detail records not obtained, a seizure not made, a site not visited. A general assertion that the police are doing nothing is difficult for a magistrate to act on. A list of five identified steps not taken is not.
If the underlying problem is that no report was registered in the first place, the earlier link in the chain is the one to fix, and our guide on getting a first information report registered, including a zero report deals with that. One last realistic note: even a successful direction from a magistrate produces an investigation, not a conviction, and the timelines remain long. The value of these steps is that they replace silence with a record and put a judicial officer in the loop.