Even
after 65 years of having freed ourselves from the repressive colonial rule, the
Indian Police has failed to transform itself amidst the colors of democracy. It
is still a symbol of oppression, cruelty and corruption. Let us examine what
stops it from becoming an epitome of security, neutrality and integrity.
Change is inevitable and so
are the challenges that crop up with the novel conditions. And with these
swirling environmental factors, any system must adapt in order to survive and
more importantly to perform efficiently. The status of Indian Police today is
retrograde and the shortcomings are conspicuous but still surprisingly nothing
concrete is being done regarding it. It still carries that repressive outlook
that the British painted to help themselves by nipping in the bud any kind of
rebellion against them. It was meant to be coercive then, but why the uncanny
continuance and the unfair silence of our so called representatives.
The Police administration is
no different and like other bureaus it is too plagued with corruption. The
corruption is more visible in the lower rungs as those construe the interface
with the people. But one cannot confidently deny the possibilities in the top
levels. People struggling to make a living in this country often feel that
knocking on the doors of Police can prove to be a costly affair and decide
otherwise. Justice apparently has also become a commodity. Corruption is though, only one of the numerous
problems of the current day policing in India. The police force of the country
is heavily overburdened and has one of the worst policeman-population ratio in
the world. Moreover, the arbitrary transfers of senior level officers in the
Indian Police is a big hurdle before attainment of efficiency and
effectiveness. Though the appointments are facilitated by a panel-system, still
they do not reflect the consideration of ability over seniority. Also, the
reluctance of registering FIRs by the policeman is a big concern. Untrained
policemen equipped with age-old rusted arms cannot fight the super equipped
militants.
It is not that efforts have not been made to reform the policing
system. Numerous committees have been constituted over the last three-four
decades but there recommendations have been lying in the dusty corners of our
bureaucracies and thus implementation remains a far off dream. It all started
with the constitution of a National Police Commission in 1977 which had many
eminent personnel of the government but somehow the reports could not be
materialized amidst the political transitions in the country. And as it happens
with every other committee, even this one was forgotten over time. The
indifference shown by the political leaders was frustrating for those who
understood the importance of police reforms in the country. And at precisely
this moment, the country witnessed a small step which was to become a major
determinant to the fate of police reforms in the country and in fact to shape
the instrumentalities of the reforms. Two retired Director General’s of Police
(DGPs) in 1996 filed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) in the Supreme Court
directing the governments to implement the recommendation of the National
Police Commission. It was only in 2006 that the Supreme Court delivered a
landmark judgment requiring the governments to implement the seven directives
as listed by the court.
In tune with these directives, the union government constituted
various high profile committees like the Ribeiro Committee, Padmanabhaiah
Committee and then more recently the Soli Sorabjee Committee. All the
recommendations given by these committees headed by erudite people in the field
of policing have the potential to overhaul it and make it efficient,
transparent and accountable. Throwing some light on these recommendations helps
us present a clearer picture of the state of affairs.
First and foremost, the investigation part should be bifurcated and
given to investigation agencies which will help the overburdened police to
maintain law and order efficiently. The dual burden has been hampering police
functioning and both the dimensions are suffering badly. And as the priority
lies with Law & Order, the investigation part has always been ignored and
thus lacks the institutional support and level of sophistication. Secondly, the
tenure of higher officials should be fixed for at least 2-3 years. That would
check the political interference. Every other day we hear and read about IPS
officers being transferred at the whims of politicians drowned in the tainted
waters of nepotism and favoritism, this needs to be curbed.
Thirdly, an independent commission should be constituted for the
appointment of heads of armed forces and higher level appointments in the
police. This would help to curtail the preponderance of political interference
in the high level decision making process of all such organizations. Another
fundamental flaw with the whole arrangement is that in case a civilian has a
grievance against Police personnel, he has almost no option to pursue.
Apparently there has been an assumption that the police personnel will never
err or will never abuse power. In this view, Police Complaint boards need to be
established at state and district levels to be headed by retired judges. This
would bring accountability and would check the arbitrariness of police working.
Lastly, we need to train the policemen in general warfare and provide them with
modern arms and ammunition. Consider the growing instances of insurgency and
naxalism across the length and breadth of the country. These military outfits
have sophisticated arsenal with them and the mildly equipped police forces are
no threat to them. Recently there have been numerous instances of our policemen
being killed by these outfits. A large part of the blame goes to the government
which is clearly not providing them adequate training and the necessary skills
and weapons to handle such situations across the red corridor of the country.
Another dimension that needs to be touched is doing away with the repressive image of the Police and
replacing it with a friendly &
approachable outlook. These are no colonial times anymore and we are a
democracy now. People still fear going to the Police for their problems, they
have lost faith in them and only think of them as the last resort. One of the
classical ways to build up relationship is cooperation and in this reference,
many projects of Community Policing
have proved to be very effective. Community policing is a platform where the
Police cooperates with the local residents and citizens to facilitate
maintenance of law and order. Moreover, in some cases the locals are entrusted
with a larger responsibility by means of forming an organization. For instance,
Delhi Police have initiated various Neighborhood Watchmen Schemes in
collaboration with the Resident Welfare Associations (RWAs) of Delhi. Such
models which facilitate locals working with the Police are proving to be
excellent avenues of inculcating faith and building effective relationships.
Moreover, the agitations taking place in the country over the State’s
inability to protect women have further aggravated the need for police reforms.
The women folks are the major victims of the harshness shown by our protectors
and most of them fear to go to the Police stations to register complaints. This
situation is worse in rural areas which are still eclipsed by the shadows of
patriarchy. The percentage of women personnel in Police is nowhere near the
global trend and a lot needs to be done in this direction. To start with, we
should train the lower rungs of the Police regarding how women victims should
be dealt with? This can be done by sensitizing the Police personnel on feminine
issues. Another way is to open All-Women Police Stations and Tamil Nadu which has
the maximum such stations in the country can be the torch bearer for the other
states to follow. As per recent reports, the country only has 442 such stations
and 13 States do not have even a single such station which clearly shows the
lack of interest by the states. The central government needs to follow up on
this in mission-mode so as to ensure security for women throughout the country.
At the commencement of the Constitution of India, we
rechristened the Indian Police force
to Indian Police Service (IPS) but
unfortunately this transformation has only been on paper and not in spirit. We
desperately need to conceptualize a framework to implement this transformation
so that these stubborn sentinels realize that they have been inducted to serve
the people of this country and not to harass them!
Published in Pardesi Pulse
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