NIA Chennai gets police station status, gets power to register FIRs

CHENNAI: NIA Chennai office finally got the much-awaited police station status.

A Go issued by the Tamil Nadu government earlier this week has declared NIA, Chennai branch office as a police station under the provisions of CrPC thus giving power to the agency to register FIR in connection with cases falling in the whole State of Tamil Nadu.

The National Investigation Agency (NIA), the premier counter-terrorism task force in India, is currently handling as many as 15 cases in the State, and has been locking horn with the Tamil Nadu government to obtain ‘police station’ status for its Chennai branch office to register FIRs for the cases they are taking up from TN.

Though the NIA had started operating in Chennai years ago, it had set up its branch office in Purasaiwalkam officially in April 2021, just before the Assembly election and has also appointed an SP rank officer to head its operations.

However, the office is yet to be formally inaugurated because the branch has been waiting for permission from the State government to function as a police station. The Chennai branch of the agency now would have full prosecution powers of a police station and be able to register cases here. Till now, cases from TN were registered in Kochi, Kerala and Delhi.