Issue Directions To Follow Uniform Font Size, Line Spacing In Preparing FIR, To Ensure Better Visibility & Readability: Orissa HC To DGP

Calling it a 'serious issue', the Bench of Justice S. K. Panigrahi directed the DGPolice, Odisha to inform all the Police Officers of all Police Stations to follow a uniform pattern of font size of 12 in Times New Roman while preparing charge sheet, F.I.R. or any reports with line spacing of 1.5.

The Director-General of Police has been directed to file an affidavit stating that he has issued instructions to all the police officers of the State regarding the use of such uniform font size and line spacing while preparing the F.I.R. or Final Form or any other reports.

The Court issued this order in a matter where the petitioner's counsel placed the copy of the charge sheet before it, which was "neither legible in open eye nor visible properly because of very tiny font size of the text prepared by the Investigating Officer".

Significantly, the Court noted,

"This is a regular phenomenon encountered by the prosecution, defence and the Court. Such smallest font size causes wastage of considerable time and energy of the Court while reading the same."

The Court also remarked,

"In fact, presenting information in a perceptually degraded fashion is an affront to the reader of the text. The font so chosen should have a higher readability quotient. Hence, the need for appropriate font size and line spacing is very important to overcome the problem of disfluency in reading."

The Court also noted that changing the font size, line spacing etc. costs almost nothing but it would have a great effect on readability quotient of the text we read.

Significantly, the Court has also directed that the handwritten documents also are prepared with better and legible handwriting as far as possible.

The affidavit of compliance has been directed to be filed within three weeks and the matter has been listed on 12.04.2021 for filing of affidavit.