An FIR Has Been Filed Against You in India. You Are Abroad.

Someone calls from India. Or you see it on a WhatsApp group. Or a relative forwards a PDF. An FIR has been registered at a police station in India with your name in it. You are in Dubai, or London, or New Jersey. You have not been to India in three years.

What it means is this: a criminal complaint has been registered with the police under the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 — which replaced the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 with effect from 1 July 2024. The police now have the authority to investigate. Depending on the offence alleged, a warrant may be issued and a Look Out Circular may be raised at Indian immigration check-posts. If you enter India — even to attend a family function, a court hearing in an unrelated matter, or to deal with property — you may be detained at the airport and handed to the investigating agency.¹

Three immediate questions determine your position: What offence is alleged? Is it bailable or non-bailable? And has a Look Out Circular already been raised against you?

I. What an FIR Actually Is

Not every complaint is an FIR. That distinction is the first thing to establish.

Under Section 173 BNSS (the successor to Section 154 CrPC), a First Information Report is information relating to the commission of a cognisable offence given to a police officer and recorded in writing. Cognisable offences are those where police may investigate and arrest without prior magistrate permission, as classified in Section 2(g) and the First Schedule of the BNSS.²

For non-cognisable offences, the police record the information as a Non-Cognisable Report under Section 175 BNSS but cannot investigate or arrest without a magistrate’s order. The complainant’s recourse in such cases is typically a private complaint before a Magistrate under Section 210 BNSS.

The distinction matters immediately: an FIR for a cognisable offence — theft, cheating, criminal breach of trust, dowry harassment, assault — triggers police investigation and the arrest machinery. A Non-Cognisable Report does not.

The registration of an FIR does not mean a chargesheet has been filed, a court has taken cognisance, or that the allegations are proven. The Supreme Court has described an FIR as the document that “sets the criminal law in motion” — it is the first step in a process that may take years before any judicial involvement. But it is the step that activates arrest powers and allows a Look Out Circular to be requested. For an NRI, this creates disproportionate consequences: arrest risks, immigration restrictions, and cross-border complications are all triggered at this first step, long before any court has examined the complaint.³

Obtaining the FIR from Abroad

Any person named as an accused has a statutory right to obtain a certified copy of the FIR under Section 173(2) BNSS. The Station House Officer of the concerned police station is legally required to provide it on request. If you are outside India, a local criminal advocate can obtain it on your behalf. The minimum you need immediately is: the FIR number and year, the name of the police station, the sections invoked under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 or any special statute (PMLA, NDPS, IT Act), and the date of registration.

Without the FIR text in hand, every subsequent legal step is guesswork.

II. Bailable vs Non-Bailable — The Immediate Classification

The first legal filter is whether the offence alleged is bailable or non-bailable under the First Schedule to the BNSS and relevant special statutes. Everything downstream — your immediate arrest risk, the urgency of an anticipatory bail application, and whether you can safely travel to India — depends on this classification.⁴

In bailable offences, the accused has a statutory right to be released on bail by the police or the magistrate. In non-bailable offences, bail is at the court’s discretion — the court examines gravity of the offence, criminal antecedents, likelihood of flight risk, and potential interference with witnesses or evidence.

Offences That Frequently Catch NRIs

Under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, several economic and matrimonial offences that appear regularly in NRI disputes are cognisable, with serious variants being non-bailable.

Criminal breach of trust under Section 316 BNS covers dishonest misappropriation of property entrusted in a fiduciary capacity — the successor to Sections 405–409 IPC. Aggravated forms involving public servants, bankers, and agents attract imprisonment up to ten years or life, and are treated as non-bailable in serious variants.⁵

Cheating under Section 318 BNS covers dishonest or fraudulent inducement to deliver property or to do something the victim would not otherwise do. Section 318(4) BNS — the successor to Section 420 IPC — concerns cheating involving delivery of property and valuable security, and is cognisable and non-bailable.⁶

Cruelty by husband or his relatives under Section 85 BNS carries forward Section 498A IPC — punishing cruelty and dowry-related harassment against a married woman. It is cognisable, non-bailable, and non-compoundable, with punishment up to three years’ imprisonment plus fine.⁷

Special statutes add further complexity. The Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA) imposes “twin conditions” for bail under Section 45 PMLA: the court must be satisfied both that the accused is not guilty and that they will not commit any offence while on bail — conditions materially harder to satisfy than ordinary bail criteria.⁸ The Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985 imposes similar twin conditions under Section 37 for commercial quantity cases.⁹

The practical rule for an NRI: if any primary section invoked is non-bailable — Section 85 BNS, Section 318(4) BNS cheating, aggravated criminal breach of trust, or PMLA/NDPS charges — do not enter India without a pre-arrest protection order in place.

III. The Look Out Circular — What It Is and How It Works

The Look Out Circular is the most dangerous mechanism in this ecosystem for an NRI, and the least understood.

A Look Out Circular is an administrative direction issued by a law enforcement or regulatory agency to the Bureau of Immigration to track, detain, or restrict the movement of a named individual at Indian ports of entry and exit — airports, sea ports, and land borders. It is not a judicial order. It requires no court involvement. It can be issued by a police officer, the CBI, the Enforcement Directorate, or by a court.¹⁰

LOCs are issued under the Foreigners Act, 1946 and under executive instructions issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs — principally the consolidated Office Memorandum dated 27 October 2010 and subsequent amendments. These directions require that LOC requests originate from officers of a specified rank or by order of a criminal court, and are routed to the Bureau of Immigration’s watchlist database used at all checkpoints.¹¹

What Happens When You Land With an Active LOC

If your name appears in the Bureau of Immigration’s database and you clear immigration at Delhi, Mumbai, or any international airport, the immigration officer receives an electronic alert when your passport is scanned. Depending on the wording of the LOC, immigration will detain you and hand you to the originating agency, or prevent you from boarding an outbound flight and inform the issuer.

In the common format used in criminal investigation cases, you are effectively in custody before any formal arrest occurs — and you are unlikely to be permitted to proceed until the originating agency decides what to do with you.

The NRI’s specific and dangerous vulnerability is this: there is no legal requirement to notify the subject that an LOC has been raised. There is no public-search database. You will discover an LOC exists only at the immigration counter — or when a court application brings it on record.¹²

Checking for an LOC

Because there is no public registry, the options are indirect. Your advocate can make inquiries with the investigating agency or through an RTI application, though disclosures may be limited on grounds of investigation privilege. The most reliable route is an anticipatory bail or quashing application — courts now routinely ask the investigating agency to disclose whether an LOC has been opened and on what terms.

Lifting an LOC

The application is typically made before the High Court under its inherent powers under Section 528 BNSS or under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, or before the trial court once proceedings are underway. Courts have quashed LOCs where the underlying case was minor, the accused had cooperated with investigation, or the LOC was disproportionate to the alleged flight risk.¹³ For an NRI who has obtained anticipatory or regular bail, courts frequently view continued LOC restrictions as unnecessary and direct their removal subject to conditions such as advance intimation of travel.

IV. Anticipatory Bail — Section 482 BNSS

The most important remedy for an NRI facing a non-bailable FIR is anticipatory bail under Section 482 BNSS — the successor to Section 438 CrPC.¹⁴

Section 482 BNSS allows any person who has reason to believe they may be arrested on accusation of a non-bailable offence to apply to the Sessions Court or the High Court for a direction that, in the event of arrest, they shall be released on bail. The application can be filed before arrest. The applicant does not need to be physically present in India. For the hearing, High Courts have increasingly permitted NRI applicants to appear by video-conference, particularly where they have stable foreign residence, no prior criminal history, and the FIR is connected to a civil or matrimonial dispute.

The Constitution Bench decision in Sushila Aggarwal v. State (NCT of Delhi) (2020) 5 SCC 1 remains the governing framework and continues to apply under the BNSS.¹⁵ The Court held that anticipatory bail need not be time-bound and can continue until the conclusion of trial unless cancelled by the court; that there is no requirement that the accused surrender and seek regular bail after the chargesheet is filed; and that courts cannot deny anticipatory bail mechanically — conditions should be tailored to ensure cooperation and secure attendance, not used as a substitute for denial.

Conditions Typically Imposed on NRI Accused

An anticipatory bail order for an NRI typically includes: appearing before the Investigating Officer on specified dates (often with liberty to request modification for virtual appearance); not leaving India without court permission when physically present in India; not tampering with evidence or contacting prosecution witnesses except through counsel; providing full contact details abroad; and undertaking to appear as and when directed.

Where PMLA or NDPS charges are involved, the anticipatory bail court must consider the Section 45 PMLA or Section 37 NDPS twin conditions in addition to ordinary bail criteria. Recent High Court decisions have confirmed that Section 45 PMLA applies with full rigour at the pre-arrest stage in money laundering matters, making anticipatory bail materially harder to obtain in those cases.¹⁶

Filing the Application from Abroad

The advocate files the application in India on behalf of the NRI applicant with a supporting affidavit typically notarised and apostilled (for Hague Convention countries) or consularly attested in the foreign country — setting out residential and employment details abroad, travel history, relationship with the complainant, and defence on the facts. An annexure with the FIR text, relevant correspondence, and passport details accompanies the application.

V. FIR Quashing — Section 528 BNSS

If the FIR is fundamentally defective — malicious in origin, disclosing no cognisable offence even if every allegation is taken at face value, or a civil dispute dressed as criminal — the correct remedy is a quashing petition before the High Court under Section 528 BNSS, the successor to Section 482 CrPC.¹⁷

Section 528 BNSS preserves the inherent powers of the High Court to make orders necessary to prevent abuse of court process or to secure the ends of justice. The Supreme Court’s framework in State of Haryana v. Bhajan Lal (1992 Supp (1) SCC 335) remains the governing template for when FIRs should be quashed.¹⁸

The Court in Bhajan Lal catalogued seven illustrative categories, most relevant to NRIs being: no offence disclosed on the face of the FIR; allegations entirely absurd or inherently improbable; or the criminal proceeding manifestly attended with mala fides and instituted with an ulterior motive for private vengeance. The seventh category — a dispute essentially civil in nature, where the criminal complaint is a weapon of harassment — is the most frequently invoked in NRI FIR quashing petitions.

Three patterns appear consistently in reported cases involving NRI accused and quashing petitions. Matrimonial disputes registered as Section 85 BNS (cruelty/dowry harassment) are filed in parallel with divorce, maintenance, or custody litigation — the criminal complaint used as leverage in the family court proceedings. Property and inheritance disputes between family members are inflated into cheating under Section 318(4) BNS. Commercial and partnership disputes are converted into criminal breach of trust under Section 316 BNS. Courts have quashed FIRs across all three patterns where the ingredients of the alleged offence were absent from the complaint even on the most charitable reading of the allegations.¹⁹

Arrest in Section 85 BNS Cases — Arnesh Kumar Safeguards

In Arnesh Kumar v. State of Bihar (2014) 8 SCC 273, the Supreme Court issued detailed directions against automatic arrest in dowry-cruelty cases under Section 498A IPC, now Section 85 BNS.²⁰ The Court directed that no arrest should be made simply because an FIR has been registered — police must satisfy themselves that arrest is necessary by applying the parameters in Section 41 CrPC, now reproduced in Section 35 BNSS. Police officers must use a checklist of factors including risk of further offence, tampering with evidence, and likelihood of absconding before deciding to arrest. These directions continue to guide arrest decisions under Section 35 BNSS, particularly in matrimonial cases.

VI. How NRI Status Specifically Affects the FIR

Being an NRI alters the risk profile across three dimensions: extradition exposure, passport consequences, and the structure of investigation cooperation.

Extradition Risk

India maintains bilateral extradition treaties with many destination states for NRIs — the UK, USA, Canada, UAE, Australia, and Singapore among them. In practice, extradition is reserved for serious offences: terrorism, large-scale financial fraud, serious organised crime, and major PMLA cases. It is principally pursued after a chargesheet has been filed, the Indian court has taken cognisance, and a non-bailable warrant or proclamation has been issued — an FIR alone is generally insufficient in treaty practice. The risk escalates if a Red Notice is issued through Interpol, which requires serious charges and a court warrant; that is a separate escalation step, not an automatic consequence of registration of an FIR. For most NRI FIRs involving matrimonial disputes, property quarrels, or commercial disagreements, extradition is not the operative risk.²¹

Passport Impoundment

Under Section 10 of the Passports Act, 1967, only the Passport Authority or a court can impound or revoke a passport — the police cannot do so directly.²² Courts sometimes direct the surrender or impounding of passports as a condition for anticipatory or regular bail in serious cases. The Supreme Court has cautioned against automatic passport impounding or Red Notices against NRIs solely on the strength of Section 85 BNS complaints, emphasising that such measures must be proportionate and justified.²³

Voluntary Cooperation vs Physical Appearance

Section 35 BNSS makes clear that arrest is an exception and written notice of appearance is the default in offences punishable with up to seven years’ imprisonment. Police are required to issue a notice of appearance in such cases and cannot automatically arrest a compliant accused.²⁴ The IO may send a Section 35(3) BNSS notice directing appearance at the police station. For an NRI, the strategy is to secure anticipatory bail first and then structure the terms of cooperation — appearing by video-conference for the IO, submitting documents and written statements, limited and scheduled in-person dates when in India — as conditions of the bail order. High Courts have begun to scrutinise overbroad Section 35 notices that require appearance every few days without clear investigative necessity and have held that such mechanical summoning defeats the purpose of the safeguard.²⁵

VII. What Courts Have Said About NRI Accused

Courts have consistently recognised that FIRs under Section 85 BNS (cruelty/dowry harassment) and related matrimonial provisions are frequently filed as leverage in matrimonial disputes. The Supreme Court and multiple High Courts have issued guidelines requiring pre-arrest inquiry before arrests in these cases.

In Social Action Forum for Manav Adhikar v. Union of India (2018) 10 SCC 443 and Rajesh Sharma v. State of U.P. (2017) 11 SCC 599 — both concerning Section 498A IPC (now Section 85 BNS) — the Supreme Court set out conditions designed to prevent abuse of the provision as a weapon while preserving its protective purpose for genuine victims.²⁶ Courts in Delhi, Bombay, and Kerala have the most developed jurisprudence on NRI anticipatory bail, including practice directions permitting video-conferencing appearances and graduated cooperation conditions that recognise the realities of foreign employment and immigration rules.

The thread running through these judgments is clear: arrest is an exception, criminal law should not be used as a first resort in civil and matrimonial disputes, and courts will not hesitate to quash FIRs that transparently serve collateral rather than prosecutorial purposes.

VIII. Practical Sequence — What to Do, in Order

No preamble. This is the sequence that matters.

The first step, within 72 hours of learning about the FIR, is to obtain the FIR through a local advocate. You need the FIR number, the sections invoked, the police station, and a certified copy. Without the text, everything else is speculation.

The second step is to classify each invoked section — bailable or non-bailable, cognisable or non-cognisable, and any special-statute overlays such as PMLA twin conditions. If any primary section is non-bailable, treat the situation as urgent.

The third step is to check for a Look Out Circular. Your advocate makes inquiries with the investigating agency. If an LOC is confirmed or suspected, do not travel to India until it has been addressed through bail proceedings or court order.

The fourth step is to file an anticipatory bail application under Section 482 BNSS in the Sessions Court or High Court of the state where the FIR is registered. This can be done without your physical presence in India. For matrimonial or property dispute-linked FIRs, simultaneously evaluate a quashing petition under Section 528 BNSS using the Bhajan Lal categories.

The fifth step is to avoid responding about the FIR on WhatsApp, social media, or in written communications without legal advice. Screenshots of informal messages routinely find their way into chargesheets and are used to allege admission, tampering, or intimidation.

The sixth step, if the FIR is transparently malicious, is to prepare the quashing petition and begin building the factual matrix — absence of ingredients, absurdity of allegations, or transparently civil character — using contemporaneous correspondence and parallel civil proceedings as exhibits.

IX. After the Anticipatory Bail Order — What Happens Next

A common misconception: anticipatory bail ends the problem. It does not.

After anticipatory bail is granted, the investigation continues. The IO may summon you for questioning. Section 193 BNSS requires investigations to be completed without unnecessary delay and directs, broadly, that investigations in serious offences should conclude within ninety days and other investigations within sixty days.²⁷ Once the chargesheet is filed, the Magistrate takes cognisance and issues process. At that stage, regular bail under Section 483 BNSS before the Sessions Court or High Court typically replaces the anticipatory bail protection, and trial proceeds.

For NRIs, courts frequently: dispense with personal appearance for routine dates permitting representation through counsel; require physical presence only at critical stages such as framing of charge, examination under the BNSS equivalent of Section 313 CrPC, and judgment; and permit exemption from appearance for non-critical hearings subject to advance intimation.

Managing an Indian criminal case while resident abroad becomes an exercise in structured compliance — keeping addresses updated, responding promptly to court directions, and aligning Indian court dates with visa and employment constraints. It is not a problem that resolves itself after the anticipatory bail order.

An FIR in India when you are abroad is a compressible legal problem — but only if managed in the right sequence. The window to act is narrow, especially around Look Out Circulars, which can be raised without any notice to you and can convert an otherwise manageable bail case into a custodial crisis at immigration. The sequence is: obtain the FIR, classify the offence, check for an LOC, and file for anticipatory bail before returning to India. Every step taken out of order makes the next one harder.

The author is a law student at Law Centre-1, Faculty of Law, University of Delhi. Views are personal.