Policing The Police

POLICING THE POLICE
Title of the Book: POLICING THE POLICE

Name of the Author: PRAVEEN KUMAR
Address: GB, HAYES HALL, HAYES ROAD,
BANGALORE-560 025 (Karnataka, INDIA)
E-Mail: pryveen@yahoo.com / pryveen@gmail.com
Year of Publication: 2000
Phone: 080-41125309
Mobiles: 9901979567 / 9945336849
Subject: INDIAN POLICE AFTER INDEPENDENCE
Loving Dedication: PRATHEEK
BOOK REVIEWS
(POLICING THE POLICE)
A POLICE officer and a prolific writer, Praveen Kumar, has published

another anthology ……….in the form of this book.……… "Policing the police"
acquires more relevance today in the context of the criminalisation of
not just politics, but of the services as well……….Coming as a sequel to
his earlier book Policing for the New Age, the author chooses to
describe policemen as "social doctors" and policing as a "surgical
operation to systematically remove cancerous growths from the body of
society”.
THE HINDU
Praveen Kumar is not only an upright police officer but also a poet and
a prolific writer.……..Policing the Police—an analytical Study of the
philosophy and field dynamics of the policing in practice highlight
various problem areas including defective selection and
recruitment,unsound training and unhealthy job culture and identifies
likely solutions for its redemption.
DECCAN HERALD
Praveen Kumar gives an insight into the Indian police set-up and
analyses the problems of the department, with interesting illustrations
from the field. Mr Kumar's book is a departure from the routine, where
he not only analyses the problems, but also suggests solutions.
THE ASIAN AGE
The author expresses concern over sycophants climbing the ladder and
reaching the top to hold the reins and guide the destiny of the police.
The result — a spiritless culture created by incompetent
leaders…….Policing the police involves self-policing. Through the book,
the author has made an honest effort to throw some light on the state of
affairs of Indian police.
THE TIMES OF INDIA
A police officer unravels his profession.

INDIA TODAY
Policing with a cause. Policing The Police by Praveen Kumar.…….delves

deeply on this core aspect of policing and lays bare the Indian Police
setup, sheath by sheath………He interprets police and policing through the
prism of a poet’s sensibilities.
THE HINDUSTAN TIMES
ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Praveen Kumar is a senior Police Officer
with the Kamataka Police. Apart from Policing
The Police, he has also authored and published
five volumes of verse – Love And Pride, Unknown Horizons and
Portraits Of Passion in English, Divya Belaku
and Bhavana in Kannada, and Policing For TheNew Age,
a treatise on the Police and Policing.
Born in Mangalore, Praveen Kumar

graduated in Science from St. Aloysius College,
Mangalore, going on to obtain a
post-graduate degree in Literature from Mysore
University. He also holds post-graduate
diplomas in Business Management and
Cooperation. In his student days he was also a
prize-winning orator and writer and shares an
active interest in interior decoration with his
wife, Smt. Jayashree. He has also appeared on
literary programmes on Doordarshan - Kavi
Sammelana and Sanchaya and interviewed several
times by different TV channels as a Poet and Police
Officer.
Stemming from his varied academic

background, are the lively far-ranging Interests
that have impelled him to write on subjects as
diverse as police procedure and poetry, striking
the perfect balance between the pursuance of
vocation and avocation.
OTHER BOOKS BY PRAVEEN KUMAR
BHAVANA
(Poems In Kannada)
THE WORK IS A BUNCH OF LILTING POEMS IN EASY, INTIMATE

AND COSY KANNADA. THEY ARE THE REVERIES OF A TRAINED
AND CRITICAL MIND OF A MATURE POET WITH AN OBSERVING
AND PENETRATING EYE AND SHARP SENSITIVITY TO THE
WORLD AROUND.......THE CANVAS FOR HIS 62 SHORT PIECES
/OF POETRY IS THE WHOLE GAMUT OF HUMAN LIFE, ITS
CHARMS AND BEAUTY..... AND IS HIGHLY ENJOYABLE.....
THERE IS ALSO A BOUQUET OF THE ECSTATIC WORLD OF
LOVERS AND ROMANCE.
THE HINDU
DIVYA BELAKU
(Poems In Kannada)
METAPHORS AND WORLD IMAGERIES, REPLETE WITH RHYME

AND RHYTHMIC FELICITY HERE FILL AND SPILL IN ALL
DIRECTIONS; THEY FLY, FLOAT AND DANCE AND ULTIMATELY
GO STILL TO ECHO WITHIN TIME AND AGAIN (Translated from
Kannada).
DR. SHIVARAMA KARANTHA
PORTRAITS OF PASSION
(Poems In English)
PRAVEEN KUMAR IS A POET, A PROLIFIC WRITER

AND A SENIOR POLICE OFFICER IN ONE.THE GENTLE
PASSIONS OF A POET, INTELLECTUAL ATTRIBUTES
OF A CREATIVE WRITER AND HARDIHOOD OF A
POLICE ADMINISTRATOR HAVE SPLICED TOGETHER
IN HIS LITERARY CREATIONS.
UNKNOWN HORIZONS
(Poems In English)
THERE IS AN ELEMENT OF DELIGHT AND SURPRISE

THROUGHOUT. THE POET IS AWARE OF THE WONDERFUL
WORLD OF NATURE AND OF MAN. SO HE IS ABLE TO EMPLOY
TELLING IMAGES TO PORTRAY HIS INNER FEELINGS OF
BEAUTY AND LOVE.
DR. M. GOPALAKRISHNA ADIGA
POLICING FOR THE NEW AGE

(Essays on Police)
THE LANGUAGE IS FLOWERY.....THERE IS A NEED TO

APPRECIATE HIS RUTHLESS EXPOSURE OF THE
CRIMINALISATION OF POLITICS AND THE POLITICISATION OF
THE POLICE... HIS TREATISES ON DOWRY DEATHS AND
THEIR INVESTIGATION AND ON POLICE DOGS ARE
CHARACTERISTICALLY THOROUGH AND SOUND MERITING
UNIVERSAL ATTENTION.....THERE IS NO DOUBT THAT THE
AUTHOR WHO HAS ALREADY ACQUIRED A REPUTATION AS
A POET IS A HIGHLY SENSITIVE AND CULTURED PERSON.
THE HINDU
PUBLISHED WORKS OF PRAVEEN KUMAR
Books
a) English writings 1) POLICING FOR THE NEW AGE (MAY 1992)

2) POLICING THE POLICE (JANUARY 2000)
b) English poems 1) UNKNOWN HORIZONS (JULY 1991)
2) PORTRAITS OF PASSION (MARCH 1997)
3) LOVE AND PRIDE (2002 IN WEB)
c) Kannada poems 1) DIVYA BELAKU (JULY 1991)
2) BHAVANA (DECEMBER 1993)
articles
a) The Hindu (Open Page)
1) INDIAN POLICE AT A CROSSROADS (6-6-1995)*

2) INTERNAL SECURITY- CHALLENGES AND APPROACH (8-8-1995)
3) INDIAN POLICE: TIME TO TAKE TOUGH DECISIONS (19-9-1995)*
4) WHAT AILS PROFESSIONAL POLICING IN INDIA? (2-1-1996)
5) NEED TO LIBERATE LAW ENFORCERS FROM UNHOLY ALLIANCES (2-4-
1996)*
6) ROLE OF POLICE IN THE RECONSTRUCTION OF INDIA (18-6-1996)*
7) WHERE THEIR LOYALTIES LIE… (27-8-1996)
8) CAUGHT IN THE VICIOUS CIRCLE OF CORRUPTION (15-10-1996)
9) POLICE STRUCTURE NEEDS THE MANAGEMENT TOUCH (31-12-1996)
10) POLICE & HUMAN RIGHTS – DOES END JUSTIFY MEANS? (18-3-1997)
11) RESTORING CREDIBILITY TO CRIME INVESTIGATION (24-6-1997)
12) WHAT AILS THE INDIAN SECRET POLICE (9-9-1997)
13) POLICE UNPROFESSIONAL (20-1-1998)*
14) LAW AND JUSTICE (23-6-1998)*
15) POLICE MORALE ERODED BY POOR ADMINISTRATION (8-9-1998)*
16) TIME TO IMPROVE THE QUALITY OF CIVIL SERVICE (2-3-1999)**
QUALITY OF CIVIL SERVICE (19-3-1999) : letter to the Editor
as answer to UPSC response in THE HINDU dated 16-3-1999.
b) The Indian Express (Editorial Page)
1) QUOTA SYSTEM CAN WEAKEN CIVIL SERVICE (6-6-1995)

2) EMPOWERING THE CBI (10-7-1997)
c) Deccan Herald (Sunday Supplementary)
1) TOWARDS SANE SERVICE (2-7-1995)*

2) LACKING VIGOUR (6-7-1997)
3) PROFESSIONAL PRIDE OF THE POLICE (28-9-1997)
4) NEED TO REVITALISE THE POLICE (23-11-1997)
5) FOR GOOD GOVERNANCE (11-11-2001)
d) The Times Of India
1) THE GUN STILL SPEAKS (21-10-1995)
e) Alive (Focus)
1) CRIME, POLITICS AND POLICE (FEBRUARY 1996)*

2) CRIMINALISATION OF POLICE (JANUARY 1997)*
3) THE INDIAN POLICE : MALADIES AND REMEDIES (SEPTEMBER 1998)*
4) THE CRUMBLING STEELFRAME OF INDIA (NOVEMBER 1998)
5) KASHMIR: THE CORE ISSUE OF NATIONHOOD (FEBRUARY 2002)
f) IJCC
1) INVESTIGATION OF DOWRY DEATH CASES (1996 – 3)

2) INDIAN INTERNAL SECURITY BUILDUP (1998 – 4)
TV appearances
a) Interviewed
1) Sanchaya (Bangalore DD) on 8-6-1992

3) Parichaya (Udaya TV) on 16-3-2000
b) Presenting Poems

2) Kavi Sammelana (Bangalore DD) on 17-10-1990
National Events
a) National Seminar
1) Political Reforms in India (centre for Policy Research & BU) on

20-3-2002
FOREWORD
Police police the people. Who police the police? How? The answer lies in
'Policing the Police'. As the author says in an article in thi work, "Policing the
police involves self-policing".This work delves deeply on this core aspect of
policing and lays bare the extant Indian Police setup, sheath by sheath, with
the precision of a master surgeon, only to rebuild it from the scratches with
the right essence of professionalism, commitment and zeal. It is an
abundantly readable magnum opus of the author and a valuable reference
for understanding the pathology and the epinosic dynamics with which the
present Indian Police suffer and
identifies likely solutions for its redemption. I am sure that this scholarly work
serves as a ready-reckoner for both polic professionals and common
readers.
This book stands out for the highest regard it holds for policing as
a profession and the paracute critique it makes of its practices in India. The
UPSC also comes under its critical gaze for its dull – witted performance.
This book has another dimension. It, in certain aspects, interprets

police and policing through the prism of a poet's sensibilities with idealistic
interpretations.The author's close association with events in police and his
close observations in the police world for nearly a quarter of a century brings
authenticity to whatever he says or analyses. The sensibilities of the author
as a poet with nearly half a dozen books of poems from him in Kannada and
English render his observations and analyses of police and policing highly
refreshing and interesting.
Bangalore, Pratheek Praveen Kumar

September 18, 1999
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
"Policing the Police" is a sequel to my earlier book/Policing for the

new age'. Most of the articles of the present book were already published in
various newspapers including The Hindu, The Indian Express, TheTimes of
India and Deccan Herald and various periodicals and journals like Alive and
The Indian Journal of Criminology and Criminalistics. All those articles are
reproduced in this book as in the original publications with the names of the
respective newspapers, periodicals and journals indicated. Some of the
responses from the readers to the original publications are also reproduced
at the end of the respective articles. I gratefully acknowledge the contribution
of the
editors of each of these newspapers, periodicals and journals, especially The
Hindu, The Indian Express and Alive, in producing this work. And also those
readers who responded to the articles through the columns of the
newspapers and periodicals.
Care is taken to emphasise certain core aspects of the discussion

and analyses, by figuring them in more than one article, depending on the
importance, to convey across ideas with right emphasis. It is hoped that this
exercise adds to the value and usefulness of the book. I would be failing in
my duty if I fail to express my gratitude to Shree A.R.Sridharan, IPS (rtd.),
former Director General of Police and former Hon'ble member of the
Karnataka Administrative Tribunal for his unstinted support and
encouragement to my intellectual exercises. He is a rare oasis of pristine
values and dignified restraint in the desert of police and bureaucracy,
inhabited by immoral hawks.
I acknowledge with deep humility, the contribution of my father, Shree

R.D.Suvarna in instilling in me the value and sense of delving deep into and
doing my best with total commitment, whatever I take up in my life. Without
that value and commitment to achieve higher in face of all odds, I would have
been nowhere and certainly nowhere this work.
October 29, 1999 - P.K.

Why This Book
For the gargantuam size of the police
organisation in India and the key-role of
policing in governing the country, the
number of books written on this subject is
absolutely exiguous.
Most of the available books are

commonplaces, hardly laying claim on
originality, creativity, imagination or insight
to the problems in the field. They are
mostly repetitions of the obvious, rendering
reading a boredom. In this sense, "Policing
The Police" marks a departure from the lot
and can be called as a rare work.
“Policing The Police" is a departure

from the worn path and tries to delve deep
into every problem by analytical
deductions interspersed with interesting
illustrations from the field. Its bold
approach is refreshing.
This book is different and outstanding as

is its author. This is a book with a
difference; a rare genre of its kind. Makes
compelling reading.
Policing The Police
Problem areas
• Very few people are privileged to have

a keek to the complexities of the police as
an organisation and the policing as a
process. Lack of transparency insulates
police and policing from the public. Left to
its own fate, complacency is eating up the
vitals of the police. Police will die a slow
death unless somebody comes out ab intra
and identifies the cancerous growth for
surgery.
• The core - problem areas include

defective selection and recruitment,
unsound training and unhealthy job
culture. Other maladies like corruption,
misplaced loyalties and lack of
professionalism flow out of these core
problems. On the final analysis, the
problem areas boil down to one specific
morbidity, that is, utterly incompetent
selection and recruitment process at higher
levels by the UPSC. Other problems flow
from this single mishandling.
. Blaming the system or the values is an

exercise in futility for the simple reason that
system and values are the creation of the
people at the top. Equally hollow is the
claim that no right persons of
unimpeachable character are available for
selection to key slots in the one billion
population of the country after
independence. Why this atrophy after
Independence? What is the
panpharmacon for the malady?
. The book addresses such problems

with clarity and vision.
What is Policing The Police?

• Police police the people. Who police
the police? How? The answer lies in
POLICING THE POLICE.
• Policing the police involves self

policing. This work delves deeply on
this core aspect of policing and lays
bare the extant Indian Police setup,
sheath by sheath, with the precision of
a master surgeon, only to rebuild it
from the scratches with the right
essence of professionalism,
commitment and zeal.
• A valuable reference for

understanding the pathology and the
epinosic dynamics with which the
present Indian Police suffer and
identifies likely solutions for its
redemption.
• The book stands out for the highest

regard it holds for policing as a
profession and the paracute critique it
makes of its practices in India. The
UPSC also comes under its critical
gaze for the dull-writted peformance.
• The author's close association with

events in police and his close
observations in the police world for
nearly a quarter of a century bring
authenticity to whatever he says or
analyses.
Praveen Kumar is a police

officer and a prolific writer on
police and policing subjects.
His articles on this and other
subjects were published in
prominent national dailies like
The Hindu. The Indian Express,
The Times of India and
Deccan Herald and English
periodicals like Alive and The
Indian Journal of Criminology
And Criminalistics of MHA,
GOI, Delhi. Some of his
articles on the sad state of
affairs in and the need of
restructuring of The Union
| Public Service Commission
I and the civil services have
I become national sensations
|and helped awakening from the
deep slumber of complacency.
Policing The Police is his

second work on the subject
postliminary to Policing For
The New Age, published in 1992.
He has four books of verse to
his credit, two in English and
two in Kannada. He has given
several programmes as poet
in dooradarshan. Born in the
port city of Mangalore as the
eldest son of Shree R.D. Suvarna
and Smt. B. Sarojini, he presently
lives in Bangalore with wife
Smt. Jayashree Praveenkumar,
and son. Pratheek Praveenkumar.
INNOVATIVE TECHNIQUES IN POLICING

Indian Police of the post-independent vintage is deeply mired in the
maelstrom of inaptitude and unprofessional indulgences non obstinate
rare exceptions. It is impaled in the skein of self-seeking objectives
and amblyopia. Motivation is the first disaster in the process.
Excellence suffers in the ambience. Those in police in India are
familiar with this mephitis. But, sadly as unenlightened as they are,
they think that they are doing a service to the police by denying the
reality. Such people have not realized the fact that a sound
reconstruction presupposes demolition. Unfortunately, these people are
perpetuating the glissade of the Indian police.
Talks of innovative techniques presupposes a sound foundation. In the

situation of a crumbling foundation as in India Police, talks of
innovative techniques appear rather cosmetic. The singular panpharmacon
convenance for the malady of the India Police is packed in just two
words: MOTIVATION and PROFESSIONALISM. Bring it, all other matters
including organizational restructuring, administrative skills, control
mechanisms, long term perspectives, accountability, efficiency,
innovative techniques, cost effectiveness, creative input, response time
etc inter se fall in line. Anything done sans the two attributes as the
backbones of the gestalt is an operose labour of carrying to a
bottomless avernus. As motivation and professionalism constitute
independent subjects for exhaustive deliberations inter se and beyond
the scope of the extant paper, I attempt a brachypterous propaedeutic on
what innovative techniques are en regle for the India Police within the
given limitations.
1) CREATION OF A DISTINCT DETECTIVE CADRE :
Policing of the ancien regime was basically identified with crime

investigations. Even now, popular perception of the Police is associated
with CRIME INVESTIGATION. The image of the Police is largely dependent
on the standard of the performance of its investigators. The pandemic
tragedy of the present Indian Police is that the investigation
ingredient of the policing is accrescently palliated by apparently more
important policing pressures. The prevarication is a major factor in the
degringolade of the police and policing standards in India postliminary
to independence.
Indian police can cover the achilles’ heel by carrying out a separate
detective cadre upto the rank of Inspectors with recruitment and
training processes more suo conforming to the needs of the detective
cadre. The cadre should be treated as a distinct entity for the purpose
of seniority and promotions. Inspectors from the detective and general
streams have to be absorbed to higher ranks on the basis of seniority
cum merit with a clear advantage of one or two years to the detective
cadre so that the best brains are illaqueated to the fold. Periodical
in-service training and tests in investigation skills have to be an
essential ingredient of the cadre management and conditional to gain
eligibility for promotion at every level. The demarche may revert Indian
police to its pristine gloria in the vital expanse of the crime
investigation.
Creation of the distinct detective cadre ncessiates perforce the

creation of investigation centres parallel to the police stations in the
process of the division of policing responsibilities at the grassroot
levels.
2) POLICE STATIONS AS GRASSROOT POLICE SYSTEM:
A system is a functionally independent unit of mutually dependent

entities that constitute the whole with or without an amblical chord
connecting to the materfamilias for sustenance. Extant police stations
can hardly be a system as per this definition. Police stations as of now
are dependent on ectogenous factors for its functions leading to
dilation of effectiveness and professionalism. On the other hand, police
stations as an ideal system must infuse credibility and compel public
co-operation.
The police Inspector in charge of a police station in the new system

must have a legal Inspector trained in law and a panel of local
representatives as statutory aides. For this, the police department must
create a new cadre of legal officers trained in law to staff the police
stations and senior police offices. On the other hand, the district
police superintendents must prepare a panel of two or three law-abiding
and distinguished nonpolitical locals of his choice for each police
station under him as democratic representatives. All major decisions and
actions of a police station must originate only after formal discussion
between the police inspector, the legal Inspector and any one from the
statutory panel of the locals and on majority decision among the three
in writing as a statutory requirement. The process helps the
democratisation of the policing at the grassroot level consectary to the
zeitgeist sans the negative aspects of the democratic process. The opus
musivum brings the advantage of a collective decision and a touch of
legal expertise and local-sense to the policing decisions and actions.
The systemic change may take away the apollyon of corruption immanent in
the ancien regime and also oppilate it too. Indeed, much depends upon
the avizefull selection of the locals by the district police
superintendent. After all, he is responsible au fond for the perficient
policing in his district.
Two techniques that constitute the bedrock for transforming Indian

police to an efficient outfit in the absence of motivation and
professionalism at higher levels are touched upon here. The Indian
police must learn to live with the cul de sac of such an absence and
consectaneous maelstrom and adapt as it is well-nigh impossibel to
breach complacency. Ergo, if anything, it must be at lower levels. And
the grassroot level is the most ideal candidate to take something pro
bono publico. Hence, a couple of isagogic techniques that I think
innovative to restructure policing and police administration at the
grassroot level are dealt in brachys here. If the new fangled techniques
are imprimis incorpsed assez bien in Indian police system, I obsign that
that contabescent Indian police is bound to experience considerable
face-lift.
THE CORE OF POLICE PROBLEMS

A Country begets the Police it deserves. The Police is the creation of
the society it polices. It inherits its values, culture, practices and
aspirations from the society to which it belongs. The ambience defines
the nature of the Police, the country begets. In this sense, India got a
Police system it deserves with all its perversions like corruption,
brutality, criminality, inefficiency, and indeed mediocrity. Nothing
more can be expected from the fall of value system India suffered after
independence. The prime attributes of the Indian Police system of the
post-independent vintage are lack of motivation, lack of professional
commitment, devastating job culture and the ineffective training system.
With the lure of money and the abuse of power as the center of the
Indian psyche and appointments and promotions even at highest levels
turning to be arbitrary after independence, both talent and government
institutions withered in the heath. Indian Police system is one of the
major casualties of the apollyon. Right people are crucial for police
and policing. Character constitutes the spine of a Police setup. Police
is the real power in the field and constitutes the strength of both the
executive and the political system. As an instrument of power, it can be
a double-edged weapon; a cornucopia of safety, security and peace while
good, and absolutely demoniac while bad. This festinated the aggravation
of the situation. All problems of the extant Police system in India flow
from this single fact; all talks other than these basic causes like
inadequate resources, unscrupulous politicians, legal and political
constraints, growing crime rate, inadequate manpower, fractured
organisation etc are either sheer misrepresentations to evade
responsibility or just manifestations of the basic causes projected
above.
The lever de rideau here is the issue why and who. It is easy to blame
unscrupulous politicians, the hors la lai, powerful and rich criminals,
the lure of money , the constraints of democracy, legal hurdles, fragile
system, fractured organisation, professional constraints, accrescently
complex and violent society, rise in crime rate, increasing work
pressure and hi-tech crimes. These factors represent the circumstances
in which Police is called to work on and show results. They constitute
the raison d’etre of the Police and do not constitute execuses for
inefficiency, nonperformance and failures. The challenge is to accept
the reality and show results. The burden is on those at the top-wrung of
the Police. It is their failures to adequately plan, organise, execute
and control that toppled the Indian Police of the democratic vintage
from its high pedastal. Their lack of foresight and vision, lack of
brilliance and foremost of all, the love of the UPSC of the mediocrity
and its certain degringolade from seventies as a responsible public
institution committed to merit and character, combined with the
unsavoury rat-race among officials to reach the top-wrung, and
consequent race to double-bend before the politcal bosses and the rich
and the powerful who count, tore the fabric of the Indian Police to
shreds after independence.
It is a rebours for the political bosses and the rich and the powerful
to turn blind eye to the willing devotion and race of the Police
top-brass to please and gratify. After-all, Gandhis and Buddhas are not
born everyday. They perforce take the advantage of the situation and
help their acolytes out of turn as a quid pro quo. The blame for this
sorry state of affair squarely lies on the Police and those who select
and recruit such less than sound character to the Police. The nexus
extends even to the rich and powerful and the hors la lai who count. How
the criminals as el patron can be policed by these weaklings and law and
order maintained?
It is preposterous to lay the blame on lack of resources or neglect of

the Police by the executive or the paucity of manpower. The truth is
that the Police is over-indulged in India by the Law-and-Order-sensitive
political and bureaucratic machinery as far as sparse resources of this
poor country is concerned. Our Police leaders conduct like spoilt
children. Most of the resources made available are squandered and
siphoned away to non-operational and non-professional extravaganza or
just wasted on unrealistic and foolhardy programmes a grands frais,
resulting in no or miniscule returns.
Another mendacity of the stock is the clamour about shortage of manpower

en face ascensive crime rate and policing responsibilities. Again, it is
an attitudinal problem. Effective policing never depends on numbers,
more so in extant hi-tech age. It is quality, planning, secrecy and
surprise that really constitute the bedrock of effective policing. Show
of strength is never a forte of good and perficient policing. The truth
is that the wastage of human resources and man-power is phenomenal in
Indian Police and criminal in proportion.
Police leadership is meant to face the reality, assess it, plan with
foresight and vision and accordingly remould the system and the
organisation. It must set the lead by right job culture. It is here that
Police leadership failed. No political boss or executive head from
outside can do the job for him for the simple reason that policing is an
extremely specialised job and no outsider can have a keek to the
intricacies of the Police and policing job.
Problems and challenges are natural in any setup. It is left to the

Police leadership to address them. The problems au fond in Police are
lack of motivation, wrong job culture, absence of professional
commitment and poor training en arriere of every other problem and
issue. While this achilles’ heel is prevalent in Indian Police
cap-a-pie, naturally the issue to be addressed is who to bell the cat.
Only public opinion and public pressures can bring about the apotropaic
change. But, Police is too a thick-skinned beast to respond to such
opinions and pressures. This is the crux of the problem. Right
recruitment and sound training alone can save Indian Police from its
avernus by fine turning a healthy job culture.
The extant police ensemble is marked by lack of human concerns and

empathy for the fellow men. This has deprived the elements of heart and
compassion from the body of the bureaucracy. Initiatives, novel ideas
and creative pursuits are seen as the antithesis of the police. This has
deprived the elements of brain and intellect from the corpus of the
police system. The result is a deadweight-police weighing down on the
live India and sucking it dry with evils and misuse of the powers
invested on it for governing and steering the country ahead.
India is an egregious forerunner in the world among countries most
corrupt in public life. The root cause of this grave malady is India’s
corrupt governance pregnant with inefficiency, indifference and gross
temulence of power devoid of human elements. Police measures have become
synonymous in popular parlance and perception in India with foolhardy
decisions and actions far removed from reality. Lack of accountability
is the leitmotiv of governance in India. This is a malengine consciously
evolved ab intra to safeguard self-interests. Power sans accountability
rendered police in India an evil per se.
The evils of policing need not always be directed only against

outsiders. Inscience knows no boundaries. Even those within may become
cruel victims of its grossly unrealistic and farcical decisions as in
the case of a highly talented and multifaceted genius who joined service
in a Southern Indian state in 1978. He was soon recognized for sheer
brilliance and purity of character as a diamond that can fit anywhere
and as a peacock among the fowls. Soon the recognition itself turned a
noose on his neck. It was assessed by the inscient bureaucracy that his
outstanding attributes might prevent him from becoming popular among the
seniors and prevent him from reaching higher levels. A two-pronged
strategy was devised. He was to be roughed-up and denied promotions to
rub-off his superior qualities and the intimidating aura till the
detrition by the sufferings forces him down to the ordinary level. Once
the job is accomplished, his lost seniority was to be restored a few
years before retirement.
He was denied promotions with the connivance of the UPSC following the
meretricious career plan year after year till his junior colleagues
became senior to him by two ranks. He was posted to most humiliating
posts and harassed endlessly. However, the process got caught in a skein
as the infaust officer refused to come down from his immanent and really
superior qualities even after two decades of immanity and sufferings
while the bureaucracy refused to yield and give up its illegal and
unconstitutional stance until the officer condescends to the mediocre
levels. The refusal of the officer to approach judiciary against the ill
treatment for redressal and his resolve to depend solely on his talents
and character helped the establishment to persist with the preposterous
process. His morale remained high throughout non obstante serious
humiliations and endless grief. He sought refuge in other fields and won
nonpareil accolades from everybody by sheer talents. His tormentors
followed him there too. The head of the State Intelligence who himself a
small-time writer and published a few books in a regional language used
esoteric threats in 2000 on the publishers of the accurst officer to
discourage them from publishing his books. The publishers who already
had published half a score books of the officer returned two manuscripts
of the officer in sheer desperation expressing helplessness en face the
police interferences. The release of one of his books of academic
interests by the State Governor in 2000 was ensured stalled in the last
minute.
Fanciful premises bordering madness tout court leading to irresponsible

and eristic career plans of that dimensions are possible only in
governance utterly lacking in accountability and only a sacred country
like India can produce such gross grief, sufferings and humiliations eo
nomine noble intensions. Lack of transparency makes such atrocities
possible and permits its practice for decades as in the case study.
The annual assessment of men and officers in the police has become a
travesty of what it used to be or meant to be. In no way, under the
present circumstances, does an ACR reflect an officer’s qualities or
capabilities. It is believed that the department would be far better off
without this pernicious evaluation process that breeds corruption and
bias. What characterises the ACR today is a distinct lack of
objectivity; it has become a means to personal ends, a medium for the
advancement of individual interests and even settlement of personal
scores. Servility is its inevitable consequence and it would not be
immoderate to say that eliminating the ACR altogether would be certainly
a step forward.
If policing is to be effective in the years ahead, specialisation is

crucial. I suggest three distinct police services with separate
recruitment and training: (1) Regulatory police or uniformed police in
charge of law and order and other regulatory duties; (2) Mainstay police
in charge of crime investigation and prevention and security and
intelligence operation; (3) Social police in charge of prevention and
investigation of all social offences and implementation of social
legislation. All three wings should have their own individual
organisations up to the district level with independent Superintendents
and staff as required, functioning in tandem in much the same way as the
Army, Navy and Air Force. At the apex, could be a specially constituted
body called the State Police Authority with the chiefs of all three
wings as members and the Chief Secretary as chairman.
All the present maladies emanate from the politicians who are only
concerned with winning the next elections. Until the organisation is
extricated from the grip of politicians, it cannot hope to rise above
the mediocre level, either in proficiency or in character. Such
mediocrity is wont to percolate downwards in a democratic setup.
An All India Police Authority accountable only to the President of India

at the national level with the regional Police Boards in States as
independent bodies should be created. The Authority must be headed by a
Supreme Court Judge with the Union Home Secretary and the Cabinet
Secretary as members and the senior most police officer of the country
as the member-secretary. The regional Police Boards must have a High
Court Judge at the helm with the Home Secretary and the Chief Secretary
as members and the State Police Chief as member-secretary. The
arrangement will bring to an end interference of any kind in police
affairs, thus enabling the personnel to function in an independent
atmosphere. These measures complete with the overhaul of the UPSC to
bring back all the former gloria of commitment to merit and character
may dawn a new era in Indian public life.
INDIAN POLICE : TIME TO TAKE TOUGH DECISIONS
It is India”s good fortune that its fabric of law and order has
withstood the effects of growing complexity of the Indian society for so
fragile is its policing. The fact that the police systems in a few
neighbouring countries of Asia and Africa are worse cannot be a solace
as the political, social and economical structures of those countries
have different backgrounds and value systems from ours. India is a
crucible wherein the dynamics and relevance of democracy in the third
world are being experimented with. The Indian police system must
necessarily meet the aspirations of democracy in fulfilling its
objective of maintaining internal order and security. This dimension has
added to the problems of policing in India. The Indian polity confronts
its police with ever greater challenges while giving it an increasingly
limited wherewithal to face them.
. A minor shift in the style of policing in the country can make a

life-and-death difference to myriad people. A wrong turn and the police
could inadvertently tear the fabric of the national life to shreds and
ruin the country. A right step and an era of perfect security, order and
peace may be created. Only an objective analysis of the needs of the
time and assessment of the situation would give the insight necessary to
make the right choice for police about the course to be pursued. Such an
analysis must be carried out by highly competent persons at the highest
level who can see things dispassionately and take decisions. They must
be people who have an overall view of things and are capable of seeing
them against the wider background of national interest. It is a
responsible job, requiring through knowledge of the nuances of police
and policing. The people who do it must be capable of taking hard
decisions which may often go against their own interests and may have
far-reaching consequences. The Indian police must give serious thought
to what it wants to be in the future and may have to take some tough
decisions.
There is an impression that the Indian police is not what it was before
Independence. The pride, toughness and commitment to duty are no more
visible. On the contrary, the Indian police has become soft humble and
easy going. Pressure from all directions has deprived it of its
vitality. The police has become a widely abused organisation by the
virtue of its submission on the wishes of its masters under false
notions of discipline. It is the popular scapegoat for anything and
everything that goes wrong in the public life. In the circumstances, a
sense of insecurity has developed among the police men.
A natural outcome of this development is taking things easy, with the

eyes and ears shut, unless career interests warrant otherwise Commitment
to policing is sacrificed in the process. These developments have
reduced the police to the level of a toy that moves only when the spring
inside unwinds. New entrants who begin eagerly soon after the training
period, begin to realise the realities.
A serious malady affecting the tough and nonsense image of the police is
the interference of people of some standing in society at all levels. An
organisation, looking for a serious image, cannot afford this intrusion.
Policing must be insulated from public pressures except at the top to
which all policing affairs must be accountable. People handling policing
should be responsible only to law and their superiors in the department
and to none else. The regulation of policies in all details must be
controlled and guided by the top. On the other hand, the line authority
of the organisation must be all powerful to guide and regulate policing
and police administration.
A police organisation, open to public pressures can do no policing worth

the name. The very idea of being receptive to pressures and interference
indicates a lack of will for objectivity and justice. It is criminal
elements which cultivate sources that have put the policing on the wrong
rails. Pressure often forces of the police to commit crimes under the
veil of authority, either by protecting criminals or more dangerously,
by replacing them with innocent people as criminals. The possibility of
the police being open to the influence of the rich and powerful,
deprives it of its credibility. A police force that works at the behest
of the rich and powerful can guard their interests only. Does democratic
India need such a police force that allows tyranny of the poor and the
helpless by the rich and powerful? The country has tolerated such a
police in the last four decades. The people, however, must now act the
demand a police that lives up to the trust placed in it.
The lack of professional objectivity is the bane of the police in
independent India. The problem was simple in British India where the
ruler and the ruled were distinctly identified and the loyalty of the
police was defined. Now, the police should do their duty by the public
and law. Misplaced loyalty with an individual, a family, a party or an
ideology amounts to violation of professional ethics. The police, in a
democracy is the guardian of public interests and public safety unlike
in the raj where the police protected the interests of the raj. This
distinction is forgotten in independent India where mental fetters are
yet to be broken and legacies of the British rule continue inveterated.
How can a police that stays loyal to personal, familial or party

interests ever discharge its functions objectively to law and general
public? What can its locus standi be when a different person or party
comes to power? A pliable police force is an asset to any individual or
party and no sensible individual or party distances it in the name of
professional ethics. It is the duty of the police not to breach the
edifice of the organisation and its spirit.
A byproduct of this degenerate trend is the rise of opportunists and

sycophants to key posts and the fall of honest persons of great calibre.
The trend creates a catena of reactions that slowly eats up the vitality
of the police organisation and reduces it to a foul bunch of bloodhounds
of the rich and powerful few. The shoddy creatures sitting court above
men of probity is a dangerous situations. This reverse order of merit is
sure to bring frustration and the collapse of the organisation someday.
The British were the forefathers of the unified Indian Police. It was a
force that met the needs of the time. In an age of rapid changes, the
opening up of new vistas and dimensions to life through inventions and
discoveries in science and technology, nothing remains constant. The
scope, design and objects of the Indian police underwent a metamorphosis
with the transfer of government to native hands. The process spawned a
phenomenon in which undemanding aspects of both the worlds survived to
create a new police culture. The distinguishing traits of the Indian
police of the British period such as objectivity, apoliticism,
commitment, discipline, quality and high standards were discarded.
Traditional Indian values such as a simplicity, charity, wisdom, mutual,
respect, and human qualities were given up too. The convenient factors
of the old and new worlds were chosen to create a new police culture
while demands on policing were at the crucial stage in the recent years
of independence.
The Indian police officers overnight rose to high positions made vacant
by the resignations of their senior British officers. The need for
creating a new work –relationship with native political leaders was an
opportunity to usher in a new police culture in free India. Soon the
police became a tool in the hands of the power-brokers of free India.
How can the police be objective, honest, apolitical, committed and
disciplined in such circumstances and how can it uphold the rule of law
and justice in line with its professional ethics in such a situation?
A job culture involves basic beliefs and principles of the organisation,

professional ethics and degree of commitment to the aspirations of the
organisation. To what extent precedence and practice mould the job
culture decides the success or otherwise of the organisation. It is
important that only the right people reach the top. A headless
organisation is better than one headed by a degenerate weakling. This is
why the policy of selection and promotion at high levels plays a vital
role in the growth of the organisation. In a democratic age of
self-seeking short-term political leadership, where sycophancy is the
sole criterion for ascending the career ladder, the policy of
recruitment and promotion is far from direct. All those committed to the
cause of police and effective policing must break the trend and
endeavour to provide a fresh lease of life for effective policing.
A serious subculture of the Indian police in Indian hands is committing

crimes to prevent and detect crimes and breaking laws to catch
law-breakers indeed in the name of showing results. The misplaced stress
on results without a concern for organisational and national goals of
law and justice only reflects a shallow intellectual commitment to duty
on the part of the top brass and the lack of desire to probe the root of
the problem.
Now, on to third-degree methods in crime detection. Even senior officers

tacitly supporting the third-degree methods applied on suspects who may
turn out to be innocent at the end, is not uncommon.
Crimes are crimes whether they are committed by the police or by the
public. What right has the police to inflict suffering on others, merely
on suspicion? After all, it is not the agency to pass judgement on
crimes. None placed the police beyond the scope of the Indian Penal
code. What justification can the police have to commit crimes to collect
evidences of other crimes? The sadistic and criminal tendencies of the
police are not more justifiable than those of the general public.
Discipline is inseparable from police. It governs all parameters of the

foce and makes its hierarchical order meaningful and purposeful, the
command-obedience relationship, sharp-edged and functional conduct,
meticulous. But these days, it is used as a cover by the people in
higher ranks to indulge in wrongdoing and to silence the conscientious
few in the lower ranks. It is also a cover to promote the interests of
juniors who support their evil deeds by sycophancy and personal loyalty;
and to suppress those juniors who are strong, proud, independent and ask
questions.
A subtle hatred for superior qualities of the subordinates in inherent

in the Indian police force of today. Another act carried out behind the
façade of discipline is an officer forcing a subordinate to achieve
personal ends. Here, the police ranks display exceptional unity in
helping a colleague to suppress the subordinate who shows the tendency
to go against his senior’s orders. Youngsters in the organisation who
drop out weaken the organisation. There are any number of examples of
fearless officers who have acted upon their conscience at the cost of
promotions and elevations.
The Indian police finds itself in a blind-spot today, at a crossroads

from where it should build bridges to the future. It must shed its
mental fetters, rise to its feet and learn to be natural. A slip at this
stage would be a tragedy while a right move would be a major turning
point.
It is indeed a crucial juncture for the Indian police.
POLICE AND THE UNDERWORLD

Behind every great fortune, there is a crime, said Balzac; behind every
great crime, there is underworld indulged in making unlimited profits.
Might is right there and only the fittest survive. Animal side of man is
at its best in this business of organised crimes. Gangs operate in
violation of accepted social norms to make fast buck. They are
antisocials and threats to the peace and security of the law-abiding
society.
POWERFUL CONNECTIONS
Pollent organisation is both a strength and weakness of crime

syndicates. Organisation provides these gangs the benefits of a
well-oiled management machinery: objectives, targets, data collection,
through planning, right recruitments, motivation, coordination,
communication system, competent direction, infrastructure, efficient
execution, leadership and accountability, and with it, the all important
ruthless efficiency. Added to this are the ruthlessness and the enormous
wealth of the crime world. The combination is deadly and the result is
powerful connections at right places doing right things at right times
in their interests. Silence and secrecy are the keys here. Powerful and
the underworld complement each other for mutual benefits and the
arrangements usually cover politicians in power, top bureaucrats, those
high-up in judiciary and enforcement agencies including the police.
Enormous ill-gotten wealth amassed by criminal methods bring powerful
connections within the reach of crime syndicates to twist the arms of
law. Thus develops an axis between underworld and the powerful to the
detriment of the country.
HAND IN GLOVE
Underworld is an independent world per se. It is a world of crimes,

secrecy, silence, fear, loyalties, dangers, wealth, outlaws, sui generis
professional norms, efficiency and wide-ranging infrastructures. Here
various gangs coexist with deadly rivalry or alliance and partnership.
There is no road in between. Choice in the netherland is between success
and imminent death. Though underworld and open world coexist on the
surface of the Earth, their objectives, values and norms of action
render them worlds apart. It is only the police from the open world keep
avizefull eyes on the underworld. They are the bridge between the open
world and the underworld and form a protective sheath between the two.
This position places them in a pivotal role vis a vis crime syndicate
survives without the active backing of the police. The support boosts
their confidence and gives strength to their criminal activities. The
police get a farthing share in the res gestae as the quid pro quo many
times over their salary. Police being hand in glove with the underworld,
is a secret known to all.
UNDERWORLD DYNAMICS
Underworld indulges in extortions, protection money rackets, running

vice-dens of gambling, prostitution, cabret, bars, massage parlours etc,
indulging in crimes like smuggling, drug peddling, adulteration of
petroleum products, land grabbing, arms shipments, hawala transactions,
forgeries in securities, extra-judicial settlement of disputes under
threats, production and sale of apocryphal products, kidnappings for
ransom and other tricks of making quick money in violation of the rules
of the country. Three facts that keep underworld operations distinct are
their secrecy, their antinational and antisocial nature and their
ability to generate huge money in a short duration. These operations are
large scale illegal enterprises run as a teamwork in secrecy and ergo
the need to keep a band of loyal and committed followers. The operations
involve risks at every step. Law enforcing agencies and rival
organisations are heels to undermine their goals. As a result, members
of the underworld are liberally rewarded for their work and loyalty and
their families are protected and looked after for life in case of the
bread-winner being killed or jailed. Similarly, disloyalty is met with
immediate lynching.
UNDESIRABLE AXIS
Though silence and secrecy are cardinal in underworld operations to help

evade proofs and the arms of law, the activities at that scale can
hardly go unnoticed by professionals like police. Underworld knows it.
It has the option of taking on the fighting the might of the state
represented by the police or keeping it contented and in good humour.
Being clever and astute businessmen as they are and huge profits at
stake, the underworld opts for cooperation in sharing a farthing
fraction of its res gestae with enforcing agencies like the police.
Police conducts prearranged raids under publicity blitz to straighten
records once in a way. Here also cases fall through in silence as a rule
in courts. In cases of genuine raids by greenhorns, underworld fautors
are alerted in advance ab intra. The backing underworld receives from
the police constitutes its spine in pursuing more and more daring and
dangerous schemes.
LUCRI CAUSA
More often than not, who is who in the underworld and who is behind what
is a public knowledge. The underworld operates on the knowledge that
mere knowledge does not constitute evidence in court of law. All cares
are taken to cover anything that constitutes valid evidence to crimes
committed. Cut-outs is the technique. Silence and secrecy is the method.
Heads of crime syndicates operate with remote control. Contract killers
are made use. Hi-tech communication systems come to them before it
reaches police. Dons guide operations from foreign countries inimical
and having no extradition treaty with the host country a la Dawood
Ibrahim holed up in Karachi with his many lieutenants operating from
Gulf and Far-East countries. An epinosic outcome of mafioso operating
from inimical foreign countries and joining hands with its governments
is the misuse of the former’s criminal networks for subversive
activities in the host country. The ISI of Pakistan used Dawood Ibrahim
in the serial bomb blasts of 1993 in Bombay. The don continues to be at
large. His various factions continue to operate in Bombay and other
cities of India sans souce. This is while their subversive activities
like the serial bomb blasts in Bombay resemble an undeclared war and
seriously sabotaged the security and peace of the country! The factions
continue to operate with great abandon in their traditional strongholds
like Bombay and spread to other major cities like Bangalore sans a trace
of remorse. Reason lies in the enormous money the underworld generates
and spends. It is public knowledge that top politicians of the country
from different political parties including a former central minister
were investigated and tried for harbouring associates of Dawood Ibrahim.
This is only iceberg. India has chief ministers having close links with
the underworld. Many rose to powerful positions with the money and
muscle of the underworld. Quid pro quo naturally follows. Underworld has
become a highly lucrative business in India.
GLAMOUR
Plush money and wealth make underworld a fastuous world. Members of the
underworld are seen in finest dresses, driving costliest cars,
frequenting best five star hotels and living in beautiful bungalows in
best localities of the town. Their ostentatious and comfortable
life-style, indulgences in sex and scandals, outrageous adventures etc.
tend to fool the hoi polloi to remanticise the underworld. The
underworld itself uses masterly propaganda to boost its image in the
public eyes. Series of popular films extolling the virtues and lives of
mafia dons as heroes being churned out from Bollywood is a common
knowledge. Indian filmworld in the taut prise of the easy funds from the
underworld help the latter to manipulate the filmworld to its advantage.
In the ensuing publicity blitz, guillible public forget that the
underworld is a pack of hors la loi indulging in antinational and
antisocial activities. The underworld knows the utility of the
sympathies of the public. It uses every trick in the book to win over an
own following.The Arun Gawli phenomenon in Bombay as an instant
political leader and the ascendancy of his Akhila Bharatiya Sena is an
extreme manifestation of such a process.
EXPANSION
Underworld tries to gain a foot –hold wherever there is enormous and

instant easy money. It does everything to grow, spread and ultimately
take over that. It be hotel business, land deals, film production of
construction business, underworld steals a share either as protection
money or returns of direct investment. When construction business dried
of plush money, underworld turned to the film world in a big way with
its easy funds at disposal for investments in the field. Recent series
of murders in the filmworld in Bombay and Bangalore are results of the
involvement of mafia in film business.
DANGEROUS GROWTH
The most dangerous trend of recent underworld phenomenon in India is the

rise of a supreme don and his unlimited powers posing threat to the
peace and security of the country. More so, while he is holed up in an
inimical foreign country and guiding operations in India by remote
control. Various factions of Dawood Ibrahim are creating havoc in
Bombay. They are now looking outside to grow. Bangalore saw myriad
gangwars and murders in recent past as a consequence . Police knew
everything and noticed every move. Underworld takes care to keep key
figures in police on the right side before forcing into a new region.
Bangalore underworld resisted Bombay underworld invading Bangalore. The
result was gangwars and murders. Police was vertically split ab intra
between the two gangs. Plans of attacks on rivals were plotted in posh
hotels and bars and murders were committed in daylight. In spite of the
knowledge of the plots and plans, police come to picture after the
commission of the crimes. In a recent instance, a key mafioso arrested
was taken to a district headquarters for further investigation. The
gangster disappeared from the toilet of a restaurant while police
officers having his custody were sipping tea in the restaurant. Such a
fredaine is not possible without the active backing and cooperation of
the police. In another instant in the same city, a police team sent from
the state capital to apprehend a budding mafia don, entered the place
where the gangster was hiding. The gangster was waitiing for his friend
in a car outside while the team arrived. A senior member of the police
team came directly to the car and informed the ganster to leave the
place immediately as they had come to arrest him. The ganster
immediately drove away from the place. The police team formally
conducted search of the place and reported back that the gangster was
not traced there. This is species of what happens in most actions
against mafioso and the underworld. In most gangwars and murders,
friendly police officers from the spot of crime are taken into
confidence and informed in advance about the impending plans by the
underworld to keep ground ready in their favour. This is the scenario of
the axis between the police and the underworld.
Underworld can be brought on knees only by breaking the axis between

them and the police. While gangsers are the visible body of the
underworld, police is its spine. Underworld cannot stand up without the
backing of the police. The axis between the two is based on the money
and muscle power of the underworld generated by massive illegalities.
Underworld is flanked by the laws operating against it on one side and
enormous money and muscle power working in its favour on the other.
Though police has the responsibility to side with the law, it finds the
money on the other side more attractive and desirable. Ergo, the vicious
axis between the police and the underworld. This is the crux of the
problem of policing the underworld. The problem needs committed police
doing professional policing that is nonexistent in extant India. The
country is caught in a 22-catch situation. Any attempt to handle the
problem of the underworld must begin with the police. Until it is done,
underworld is bound to grow from strength to strength to eat up the
vitals of the country and render it hollow democratically.
THE CRUMBLING STEELFRAME OF INDIA

The malleability of the Civil Services has been a cause for concern.
Once considered the backbone of administration, the steel frame
today is a pale shadow of its former self, needing urgent reorganisation
The All India Service were once called the Steel Frame that held India,
a country which consisted of diverse political systems, comprising
British Indian and many other big and small princely States, together.
If India is one today- though in truncated form-the efficiency of its
vintage. All India Services is as much responsible for this as the might
of the British Empire.
The credit for India having made impressive progress, both in the
domestic and international fields and having survived the uncertain,
initial years of democracy, under leaders who had no experience of
ruling a country of India’s size and diversity, also goes to the
original All India Services- to its traditions and efficiency, that
continued to survive for some years even after Independence.
The sterling performances of Sardar Vallabh Bhai Patel in the

unification of India and the brilliant achievements of Jawaharalal Nehru
in the international field are as much the success stories of their
civil servant secretaries and advisers as of the leaders themselves.
The fall in standards of the All India Services, in the values of their
officers and in their efficiency and performance, is symbolic of the
fall India itself has experienced.
The All India Services experienced a setback after Independence. This

deterioration was in depth of ideas, quality of performance and honesty
of convictions of their officers. With this deterioration, to All India
Service are no longer in a class of their own. Its members can no longer
claim a distinguished standing in society as the All India Services have
been reduced to merely good careers.
The Civil Services had inherited, as a result of their exclusive place

in the higher levels of administration, high pay packets and good
perquisites, attractive service conditions and an awe-inspiring
tradition. But since this was not accompanied by superior performance,
the consequence is that the reins of democratic India are now in the
hands of people who are in no way superior in terms of intellectual
worth, administrative skill or human qualities. This is a tragedy for a
democracy struggling to progress.
The British created to All India Services to handle the administration

of the country. They recruited talented people, imparted the best
possible training to them and invested them with the trust, powers and
opportunities to carry out their responsibilities.
They took care of all their personal needs, provided them with many
opportunities for growth and surrounded them with a halo of exclusivity
by endowing them with high social status and providing them with
generous creature comforts.
Independent India needed brilliant people to handle its complex

administrative problems and to implement its developmental schemes. It
is tragic that India after independence not only failed to realise the
importance of maintaining its Steel Frame and improving upon it, but
positively contributed to its collapse in a very short span of time.
Indian leaders wanted the All India Service of independent India to

break away from the British model they had originally been based on and
they gave expression to this desire by altering the name of the
Services. It is ironical that the change in name also initiated a steep
fall in the quality of the Civil Services.
At present, the Indian Administrative Services is not even a pale shadow

of the old Indian Civil Services. The Indian Foreign Service stands
nowhere near the brilliant Indian Political Service and the present
Indian Police Service lacks the backbone and professionalism of the good
old Indian Police.
A major cause for the disappearance of excellence from the All India
Services of independent India was the secret tendency of the new leaders
to look at the All India Services as their rivals in running the
country, rather than as the backbone of the State. A subtle fear of the
All India Services inherited from British India days accompanied by a
sense of awe that the services inspired because of the halo worn by its
predecessor, stirred the new leaders who made every effort to cut the
Civil Services to size and show them their proper place.
SORRY STATE OF AFFAIRS
This occurred together with a fall in the standards of management of the

Civil Services because of the failure to recognise the importance of the
Civil Services in administering the nation. This fall succeeded in
bringing the All India Services of the post Independence era to its
present state.
This brought the Services closer to the people of India in a way, while
stripping it of all its brilliance, excellence and efficiency to give
India a mediocre All India Services to handle its administration. And
the result of this is the present state of the country.
The poor state of the Civil Services attracted people of poor calibre.
This led to all kinds of evils including corruption, opportunism and
lack of moral strength to stand by one’s values and convictions.
This situation led to loss of face and subordinated the All India
Services to the ambitions of the political leadership. Its has been a
long journey from the bold and awe-inspiring All India Services that
existed at the dawn of Independence to the present meek and servile All
India Services without any backbone to stand erect and hold its head
high.
The reasons for the fall and the mechanism that brought about the
change, are not far to seek. Everything that made the All India Services
of the British days a powerful adminicle for the administration was just
swept away while its new avatar in independent India was brought into
existence.
The glory of the old All India Services was built on the 3 basic
strengths of faultless recruitment, perfect training and the maintenance
of the highest standards of professionalism and character t sustain it
throughout. These strengths held the Steel Frame of India together for
nearly a century. But independent India just failed to give these
factors the importance they deserved while constituting its version of
the All Indian Services.
The primacy British India gave to the process of selection of people of

high calibre to the All India Services is perhaps the single major
factor that made the Civil Services among the best in the world.
Promising people with maturity and intellectual superiority were
selected young through a vigorous and efficient filtering process of a
carefully devised elaborate public civil examination process under the
guidance, supervision and control of highly qualified professionals in
the field.
Rarely was anything other than exceptional merit considered in the

process of selection and human weakness like nepotism, corruption and
parochial considerations rarely interfered in the process, as Britain
was not prepared to compromise and accept anyone less than the best in
the higher levels of administration. These people were, after all, to
sit on equal terms with them and help in administering the country!
These high standards in the process of selection and recruitment, made
the All India Services of British days, a really superior cadre.
REASONS FOR DETERIORATION

The grand structure of British rule was to be mercilessly demolished
later by independent India. Unimaginative and messy selection and
recruitment procedures, which were poorly conceived and unskilfully
executed became the order of the day. Corruption, nepotism, narrow
considerations and caste and economic reservations corroded the
foundations of the newly-constituted All India Services as time passed.
The reasons for this deterioration in the Civil Services are many. The
first is the general lack of passion for quality and excellence in the
Indian psyche. The agency in charge of the process of such selections,
namely, the Union Public Service Commission, unlike in the British
period, is unfortunately increasingly being manned by people unequal to
the task either in terms of their professionalism, efficiency and
passion for brilliance or in their basic character itself.
As the selection of members of the UPSC became politicised, mediocre

people came to fill the slots and in the process, selections to the All
India Services suffered. Since members owed their memberships or
chairmanship to their political leaders, they could not avoid the
obligatory quid pro quo. This continues to be the state of affairs
today.
The Indian Civil Service, which once produced giants like K.P.S. Menon,
now produces in its new avatar of the IAS and Allied Services only
pigmies without voice or strength of conviction. In this matter, they
are like those in the crippled institution of the union Public Service
Commission who select them. The Steel Frame of the IAS has nor become a
gilded plastic frame with its steel conscience crumbling into a plastic
conscience in the present uncertain political atmosphere. A Steel Frame
Civil Service would never have permitted such a degeneration.
The degeneration is manifeast at all ranks in all services, whether it

is the administrative service, the foreign service, the police service,
the forest service, the central services or the specialised services,
whether at the sub-divisional or provincial level or at the highest
levels of Central Government. The degeneration is uniform everywhere.
Whether it be in creative genius, intellectual heights, strength of

character, moral values, width of human interests or noble qualities,
the Civil Service of the post-Independence era are third rate. It does
not have its own voice or any originality. Its members either as Chief
Secretaries of State Governments or as Secretaries of various ministries
of departments, are at best paper-pushers and mindless approvers of
reports incompetently prepared by subordinates down the line.
Imagine people of such calibre presiding over the entire Civil Services.
Thus develops a vicious circle that promotes the degeneration of the
Civil Services.
Sturdy and sterling All Indian Services are indispensable for the
survival of democratic and united India. Whether it is a cadre of
generalists as the Indian Administrative Service is, or cadres of
specialists in the fields of judiciary, health care, engineering,
economics, foreign service, police etc the existence of All Indian
Services functions as the basis of governance of India and adds to the
emotional bonds binding the country together.
Also, as a pool of the cream of the people, it is supposed to bring

distinguished and brilliant people to the job of administration of the
country and thereby ensure good government to the country.
THE REMEDY
Any dilution of the high standards of these services is certain to throw

the country to the wolves. British India knew this and perhaps,
independent India also knows it. But it does nothing to arrest the
dangerous fall in the standards of its All India Services.
India is preoccupied with myriad issues relating to economic and social

development and perhaps the rapid deterioration of its All India
Services does not appear to be important in comparison with these
burning issues. But such a feeling is wrong. All India Services are a
precondition for the survival of India. India must realise this fact and
act fast.
This brings us to the quintessential question as to how the Civil

Services can be brought back to their original standards and glory. How
can we get back the original ideas, quality and performances and honesty
of convictions that existed earlier?
The first and foremost task in this regard is pruning the Civil Services
to a small brains trust of brilliance and commitment which will steer
the country in the right direction by giving competent advice on
statecraft and actually running the administration to political leaders.
A TINY SELECT GROUP:
Merciless pruning of the extant services to create this tiny, efficient

and highly responsible core is a priority task. Only brilliance and the
highest potential should be the criteria for membership in this
nerve-centre.
This brains trust must be kept beyond the purview of extraneous
constraints like reservation of any kind and even age restrictions. The
guiding principle here is bringing together the best talents without
restraints of any kind, for ensuring best results. The services should
not be treated as an employment opportunity for the elite, but as the
foundation of the Government.
INTELLECTUAL CALIBRE:
The training programmes for the services have to be made relevant today.
Matter taught has to be updated every year by experts and made changing
evento the brightest among the new recruits, unlike present training
programmes which are intellectually impoverished, irrelevant to the
times and which in no way help ensuring the right attitudes at the
higher levels.
Another need is to make the passing of a promotional test, of a very

standard, held by the UPSC or a similar Central agency, mandatory for
promotion at every level. Only such tough measures will keep the Civil
Services fit and productive as is required for the sound health of the
administration of the country.
TONING UP THE UPSC:

Overhauling the present mediocre Union Public Service Commission to
create an efficient and responsible set-up capable of handling the
enormous responsibilities under Article 320 of the Indian Constitution,
is essential in order to arrest the degeneration that has set in, in the
set-up. This has led to blunders in identifying talent and in managing
the Civil Services.
CREDIBILITY OF THE UPSC:

In a recent case, 3 promising officers from the State cadre of a
southern State of India, were denied selection by the UPSC to an All
India Service for no obvious reason for 10 years from 1990, while their
juniors were elevated. The acute frustration and demoralisation caused
by this led to the break-up of the family of one of the promising trio.
Violent behaviour by him repeatedly in public led to very embarrassing

public humiliations, and ultimately involvement in a murder case led to
his conviction. This is how a reckless and irresponsible UPSC ruined a
promising life for no reason at all.
However, another of the trio was an officer of enormous inner strength

as well as a poet and an intellectual of the highest calibre. He
weathered the frustration of the 9 years to rise to a very high level in
individual achievement and public esteem to the shame of the
irresponsible UPSC.
The incident created much resentment in the State against the

recklessness of the UPSC and considerably lowered its credibility. Such
transgressions are common these days with the present state of affairs
in the UPSC and the overhauling of the organisation should be aimed at
preventing such irresponsible actions that can have such tragic
consequences.
REORGANISATION OF THE UPSC:

The way to prevent such unprofessionalism on the part of the UPSC lies
in transforming it to a highly efficient outfit managed by people of
unimpeachable character and efficiency. This objective can be achieved
by suitable amendment to Articles 316 and 317 of the Indian Constitution
to ensure that only suitable people become Members and Chairman of the
organisation and remain in the saddle only as long as they retain their
moral and professional calibre.
This can be made possible by constituting a committee comprising the

Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, the Chief Commissioner of the
Central Vigilance Commission and the Speaker of Parliament as members.
The Vice-President of India should be the Chairman and clear the names
for appointment as Members and as the Chairman of the UPSC for a fixed
tenure. These people should also be empowered to initiate actions for
their removal by an appropriate procedure in fit cases.
Appropriate changes to this effect in Articles 316 and 317 of the Indian
Constitution are likely to plug the existing loopholes that allow too
much political interferences in the process of the selection of Members
and Chairman of the UPSC and thereby in its fair functioning.
CAUGHT IN THE VICIOUS CIRCLE OF CORRUPTION
The Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, Mr.M.Karunanidhi, in a scathing attack on

the Tamil Nadu police after he assumed charge of the State Government in
1996, said “ Three fourths of the police force, which, to the State, is
like liver to human body, has become rotten.” The remark coming from an
experienced chief executive of a State distinguished for its efficient
police force until a few decades ago indicates the atrophy that has set
in, in the Indian police. The department cannot stay untouched while
there is marked fall in the standards of diligence and integrity in
other walks of life. Indian police adopted and adapted itself to corrupt
surroundings.
The basic ingredients of corruption in India are money and power. As

Government service, even at the higher rungs, has lost its charm in
terms of remuneration and status, it has been attracting only the second
best among youth who otherwise would be left in the lurch. Professional
dignity and integrity have been brushed aside leading to corruption.
Priorities in service have been shuffled, the sole objective being money
and power. Organisational objectives have been completely lost sight of.
Shift in diligence helped to build money-power while shift in loyalties
facilitated proximity to power-brokers. The degeneration spread rapidly
with the passage of time as organisational commitments became outdated
demode and pragmatism taught that immediate personal interests are for
leading a good life. This was the beginning of corruption of Indian
police.
A major contributing factor has been the gross fall in professional

pride among the personnel. Grass and insensitive handing of the
policemen and police matters by political leaders has eroded the morale
and the sense of belonging to the police force. Attempts to suppress and
gain complete hold over the bureaucracy and the police in democratic
India have affected the police adversely causing a sense of inadequacy.
The lack of motivation to achieve organisational goals and show results

is a clear manifestation of the fall in professional pride. The police,
which once was proud to enforce law, to maintain order and to ensure
peace and security, have lost all the enthusiasm as these factors became
political and lost their importance otherwise. Crimes, criminals and law
and order problems were all subject to political convenience. The
development shattered the professional pride of the police and struck a
blow to their motivation towards organisational ends. No organisation
can exist without a driving force to sustain it. When there is a vacuum
of a drive to carry it onward, it is filled by corruption.
Policing is more a profession than a job. While job involves performing

a task entrusted, profession entails dedication and commitment to a
cause; in the case of the police upholding the rule of law and
safeguarding the security of the country. How dedicated are the police
to this cause in India? Simple observation of criminal activities around
and police responses to them give clues to the situation.
Let us take an obvious example- open sale of smuggled articles in

exclusive markets maintained for the purpose in major cities of India.
The common justification of the police for allowing such markets to do
business is that no hard evidences to prove offence are available. This
is unbelievable. If the police, with the resources at its disposals
cannot collect evidence against the illegal activities conducted openly
on such a large scale, it is not worth being in existence. There is not
even a single case anywhere in India of such exclusive markets dealing
with smuggled articles being shut down and the illegal activities being
brought to a halt by prosecuting the sharks of the smuggling world.
The same is true of stolen articles. The footpath vendors in specified

market areas trade in consumer goods, running to crores of rupees each
day, without paying legal dues to the Government in the form of sales
and income taxes and in violation of various rules and laws. The illegal
business contributes to the growth of parallel economy of black money in
the country. These markets thrive before the eyes of the local police
force.
Either the police do not have the professional resolve to bring the
illegal activities to halt or the offenders who indulge in them have the
police backing in running the business. In other words, the police are
hand in glove with them.
The leeway involved in the exercise of power, coupled with the

sensitivity of the job, renders the force vulnerable to corruption.
Letting gambling dens flourish, backing the manufacture and sale of
illicit liquor, overlooking prostitution, black-marketing and drug
trafficking, changing the course of investigation to save certain
criminals or deciding the process of arrests and seizures to favour
certain individuals or parties, make life different for the people
involved. On the one hand, illicit business carried out with police
patronage or tacit support make huge grists in which the police
naturally have a huge share. On the other hand, the culprits are
prepared to pay any price in order to divert the attention of the
police. Huge sums of money change hands either to avoid arrest, search
and seizure or to change the very course of investigation. The police
can be part of such dirty deals without leaving a clue.
A fall-out of corruption is, the dishonest thrive at the cost of honest

professional. Flexible elements are useful assets to people in key
positions to save their kith and kin as the when they get involved in
criminal proceedings. Such characters in police are always cultivated
and posted to key positions so that compromises can be easily mached
Honest police officers are sidelined.
The need for police is limited to the need to have an obedient force at
the disposal of the rulers for use wherever they feel like. The
existence of such a force gives the common man a feeling of security.
The force also helps to absorb the blames heaped on the rulers while
things go wrong. While these cardinal goals are met by the mere
existence of the police, anything in addition, say professionalism,
integrity and honesty become achronisms. The general perception is that
an upright police force is always an inconvenience to the people and
therefore is not always tolerated and encouraged.
Corrupt police is the product of a corrupt society and corrupt police in
turn perpetuate corruption in society. This forms a vicious circle. As
corruption takes control and spreads to all strata of the force, upright
elements in the force become a minority and also forfeit the coveted
position in the organisation as inconvenient candidates. They are
scorned, detested and avoided as moles in the mainstream. Taking
recourse to unfair and illegal means to crush upright officers in also
not uncommon. Though courts of law can theoretically protect officers
against such harassment, expenses, time and uncertainties involved and
the history of court judgements render the protection meaningless and
force the upright officer to silently bear all humiliations and losses
or yield to the pressures. It is to the credit of Indian police that it
has great officers who have withstood all slights without yielding to
pressure.
In the olden days, corruption was confined to the lower strata of

officials. The situation has changed now; it originates from the above
and percolates downwards. An intelligence chief may drive his unwilling
subordinates to adopt all sorts of illegal methods including telephone
tapping, political espionage and other dirty tricks in his attempts to
win over his political masters and may even succeed at the cost of more
senior aspirants. Now, what about the subordinates once his business is
done. His worry is how to use his new position to further his prospects
before he retires in a few months. As the date of retirement approaches,
his perception of right and wrong blurs in the lust to make the most of
the position. This is the crux of the problem of corruption.
Freeing the police from the grip of corruption is a priority for

rebuilding India. A non-corrupt police is the beacon of a healthy
society. The police can usher in a healthy social life in the country
only by first getting itself rid of the cobwebs of corruption and then
infusing professionalism in its work. It must elevate itself to the
heights expected of it as the guardian of the rule of law, justice and
fairness in the social structure of the country.
NEED TO LIBERATE LAW ENFORCERS FROM

UNHOLY ALLIANCES
Crime, politics and the police are the three sides of the vicious
triangle within which the future of democratic Indian and its free
people are trapped. Although wealthy industrial and commercial houses
form a fourth dimension, their techniques are as yet limited to
manipulative strategies to gain a strangle hold over political power by
remote control. It is their wealth that fills the coffers of the troika
and helps reduce the normal life of free citizens to a welter of
uncertainties and endless misery.
Politicians protect criminals from the law while criminals reciprocate

by acting as their henchmen. Policemen go to politicians for job
protection and strike an understanding with the criminals to make money.
Thus works this nexus of vile power-brokers, preying on innocent people,
bloating itself on the blood of the hapless masses. The trio of
manipulators is a dangerous force in the Indian democratic situation.
Combined as a tight-knit power-block, they have touched all the facets
of public life with the sole intention of garnering all the benefits.
The tragedy here is that the vice is perpetrated by those whom the
public trust as their benefactors and protectors. The amoral side of
this operation does not seem to have affected either the police or the
politicians in any way and the abuse against the Indian public goes on
unabated. It seems that all actors in this tragic drama think that
Indian democracy is a free-for-all field to grab to the maximum in a
world where all look for themselves and only those who grab the most
survive. This approach is certain to undermine not only the democratic
setup of the nation, but its very social fabric.
When the maintenance of law and order is in the hands of unscrupulous

police, queer things may take place. Long ago, a dacoity was reported in
the house of a person of dubious reputation in a particular district .
People who knew the background said the act was committed by his
illegitimate son after a serious quarrel. Court cases were pending
against the son. A case was registered with the local police. The
complainant however thought it was best to patch up with the suspect in
order to protect his family honour. This was done and the case was
pursued with an ex-convict being picked up and shown as the accused.
Arrest,” recovery” and chargesheet followed a decade after the dacoity.
Such developments make criminal administration a mockery. What a serious
breach of public trust it was and what a serious crime was committed by
the police who involved a person whom they knew did not commit the
offence!
In another incident that dates back to 1981, a police official in charge

of a subdivision in Karnataka picked up a poor goldsmith from a small
town for interrogation about receiving stolen properties. He subjected
him to torture in a tourist bungalow of the same town for two nights to
make the innocent goldsmith confess to something he had not done.
The goldsmith died on the second night of torture. The official who has
worked as Circle Inspector in the town until a few months before, had
indulged in this activity without the knowledge of the senior police
officers of the town. The news of the lockup death, as such deaths are
popularly known, was published in local and other newspapers.
The wife of the goldsmith filed a complaint before the local court. The
District Superintendent of Police and the Range Deputy Inspector General
of Police, who had benefited from the flexible ways of the official when
he was the Circle Inspector, rose to the occasion to save their protégé.
They visited the town and entrusted the investigation to a Deputy
Superintendent of Police of neighbouring subdivision with oral orders to
certify the case as not proved. The Deputy Superintendent complied and
sent his repot to the court and that was the end of the case. A police
official who with the support of his community, got posted as the police
chief of a State in 1986, wanted to favour a fingerprint sub-Inspector,
who has been under suspension for long after being arrested in a
criminal case of community interests. He summoned the Superintendent of
Police in charge of the case and examined the file about the suspension.
The Superintendent of Police failed to understand that the action was an
indication that he was to end the Sub-Inspector’s punishment. Even of he
had understood, he could not have acted for, the Sub-Inspector had been
suspended by an officer of the rank of the Deputy Inspector General of
Police, Moreover the case was pending trial in a court. After a
fortnight, the police chief secured the Sub-Inspector’s release, but
nurtured a grudge against the young Superintendent. He manipulated the
records and made sure that the latter was not selected for the Indian
Police Service. The career of a bright officer suffered a severe
setback. Such cases of avenging non-cooperation are common these days.
The trend is adversely affecting the organisation by weakening its cause
for fairness, law and justice.
How subordinates are brought around is another story. A young sub

divisional police officer in a small town known for its speculative
business activities conducted a raid on a library, run by a powerful
local community. It was actually a gambling house patronised by
prominent people of the town. The officer rounded up more than 50
prominent people including rich businessmen, senior government officials
and local politicians, with huge stake monies. Though the library had
been a gambling den for years, none had dared to raid it in spite of
repeated public petitions.
As the law requires that the place must first be proved to be a common
gambling house, the officer recorded in the station house diary the
names of all those who were gambling at the place and let them of with a
written warning that cases would be booked if they continued to gamble
there. The officer learnt too late that the gambling den was patronised
by the Superintendent of Police of the district and the Deputy Inspector
General of the range and the men were their friends. He was transferred
to a remote place, with the annual confidential report stating that the
public might revolt against the officer if he continued . The library
continues to be a gambling den. The DIG at the place of the new posting
of the officer wanted him to marry a girl from his circle. His parents
however, got him married to a girl of their choice. This antagonised the
DIG who, in his next annual confidential report, showed his junior as a
liability to the police department. Also he prevailed upon other
officers who wrote confidential reports to give adverse remarks. Most of
them obliged and the appeals of the junior officer were never allowed to
reach the government.
It is to his credit that the officer did not break down and continues in
service while his far less competent colleagues have overtaken him on
the career ladder. Denied selection to the all-India service, he later
appealed to the Chief Secretary not to consider him any more for the
service. He took this drastic step in utter contempt for the corrupt
department heads who sat above him and decided his career advances.
Is it by design or accident that independent India has raised a criminal

outfit to catch criminals? It is in the interest of the police to accept
the reality so that remedy could be thought of.
Unhealthy practices of myriad variety are found at the highest levels. A

recent instance is that of a police chief who, along with his wife, was
taken to court on the eve of his retirement to face trial for defrauding
the public and a spastic society in whose name he sold(charity)
entertainment tickets. It is a different story that the officer managed
to silence the social worker who brought up the charges and made sure
the case fell through for lack of evidence. To what sad levels could men
in high ranks stoop to make a few dirty bucks!
The Indian Police Service continues to be an intellectually poor

unattractive realm with only the mediocre opting for it. The
constabulary which forms the bulk of the service is largely constituted
by people from the lower strata of society who are diffident and hence
do not exercise their powers against the more enlightened people. The
tendency to foul-up superior intellect and excellence is another factor
that has adversely affected the police setup. The general reluctance to
adopt modern techniques of policing and management, the dogmatic
approach to man-to-man and public relations and the lack of
understanding of human nature are other factors responsible for the
unfortunate state of affairs. These problems can be overcome only by
efficient police leadership at all levels and only if a semblance of
objectivity reasonableness and good judgement touches the core of the
police administration.
At present, growth is not much more than a spasmodic reaction to stimuli

and lacks the benefit of an integrated approach. A permanent cell of
organisation experts under the direct control of the police chief to
redefine the police organisation is required to make it more meaningful
and need-based. This could help in streamlining the hierarchy by
eliminating redundant posts, rationalising workloads, preventing
duplication and redefining duties and procedures and thus the rights and
responsibilities at each level. Result: police functioning would be made
more cost-effective and efficient.
travesty of what it used to be or meant to be. In no way, under the
capabilities. It is believed that the department would be far better off
without this pernicious evaluation process that breeds corruption and
bias. What characterises the ACR today is a distinct lack of
objectivity; it has become a means to personal ends, a medium for the
advancement of individual interests and even settlement of personal
scores. Servility is its inevitable consequence and it would not be
immoderate to say that eliminating the ACR altogether would be certainly
a step forward. If policing is to be effective in the years ahead,
specialisation is crucial. I suggest three distinct police services with
separate recruitment and training: (1) Regulatory police or uniformed
police in charge of law and order and other regulatory duties; (2)
Mainstay police in charge of crime investigation and prevention and
security and intelligence operation; (3) Social police in charge of
prevention and investigation of all social offences and implementation
of social legislation. All three wings should have their own individual
organisations up to the district level with independent Superintendents
and staff as required, functioning in tandem in much the same way as the
Army, Navy and Air Force. At the apex could be a specially constituted
body called the State Police Authority with the chiefs of all three
wings as members and the Chief Secretary as chairman.
All the present maladies emanate from the politicians who are only
concerned with winning the next elections. Until the organisation is
extricated from the grip of politicians, it cannot hope to rise above
the mediocre level, either in proficiency or in character. Such
mediocrity is wont to percolate downwards in a democratic setup.
An All India Police Authority accountable only to th President of India

at the national level with the regional Police Boards in States as
independent bodies should be created. The Authority must be headed by a
Supreme Court judge with the Union Home Secretary and the Cabinet
Secretary as members and the senior most police officer of the country
as the member-secretary. The regional Police Boards must have a High
Court Judge at the helm with the Home secretary and the Chief Secretary
as members and the State Police chief as member-secretary. The
arrangement will bring to an end interference of any kind in police
affairs, thus enabling the personnel to function in an independent
atmosphere.
POLICE UNPROFESSIONAL
Policemen are executives of law and executors of the rule of law. As
professionals, their only interests are the laws of the country and its
enforcement at all costs including personal safety and self-interests.
This, however, is only an ideal situation. The job culture and peer
pressure play a major role in setting the standards in an organisation.
This situation is not quite happy regarding the Indian police now. The
reason is the general collapse of the professional instinct, caused by
the degeneration of values. Society gets the police it deserves. A
country of self-seekers naturally has a self-seeking police force and
the consequence is lawlessness. This is the malady India suffers from.
The symptoms are crime, disorder and insecurity that have kept the
country and its people in a stranglehold.
An incident that took place 16 years ago in Chitradurga district of

Karnataka will illustrate the kind of professional commitment Indian
police pursue. A gambling den was raided by the police and the owner
spoke lowly of the DIGP whom he said was taking “ mamools” from him
every month. The matter was reported by a local newspaper. This
infuriated the DIG and the police turned its ire on the newspaper. The
Deputy Superintendent of Police of the sub-division in which the range
headquarters was situated joined the fight and a gang ransacked the
office and the press of the news paper a week later. Though a case was
registered with the local police station and the owner of the newspaper
moved heaven and earth to bring the culprits to book, nothing came out
of it and the case went undetected. But the people knew who were behind
it all.
Such episodes shatter the trust of the public who cannot look upon the
police as the guardian of their rights and interests. Basically, lapses
lie more in the concepts than in individuals. The police as a collective
force operated to wreak vengeance on the newspaper for factual
reporting, though somewhat indiscreet. But going on a rampage, however
highly placed the officer in question could be, in nothing but, making a
mockery of professional objectives. The most disturbing aspect of the
present Indian police is the slow and steady process of replacement of
the passion for law, justice and fairness by a single-pointed indulgence
of self-seeking tendencies as the drive of the police system. Much more
disquieting is the attitude of the public about the development and
their complete dependence on the police as the protector of their legal
rights, provider of security ad dispenser of justice. What is actually
happening is a great betrayal. Indeed, the tool, namely the police, is
there to enforce law and provide security. But it has become the
handmaid of the rich and influential and serves the interests of the
people in that stratum of the population.
Self-seeking tendencies express themselves at all levels of policing and

management of organisational matters. As far as policing is concerned,
be it crime-prevention or investigation, collection of intelligence or
management of internal security or maintaining law and order,
self-interest has role to play. It’s expression in crime management is
too obvious a matter.
While intelligence collection is becoming a politically oriented

function, internal security operations are no more than providing cover
to political bigwigs and other influential people at the cost of more
pressing problems of national magnitude.
Law and order has become a tool in the hands of the politicians and the
policemen make themselves available for such games. In the process,
honest policemen suffer and the morale of the system receives a serious
setback. The result is lawlessness spawned by the absence of effective
policing and wrong models as the protectors of law.
The parochial instinct of the police expresses itself in the management

and organisational matters. Under the cover of discipline and the need
of tacit obedience, the game of favouritism is wilfully played on the
one hand and any resistance is ruthlessly crushed on the other.
Organisational processes such as promotions and transfers are widely
used to achieve personal ends. Posts with no job content are created in
various ranks primarily to accommodate officers who refuse to fall in
line with the higherups for reasons of conscience and professional
integrity. It an upright officer takes a sinecure posting in his stride
and refuses to part with his principles, he is harassed through other
means. Recently the commandant of a training college pressed his
higherups and the state Home Secretary for the removal of a functionary
of the college from his important postion. The latter was accused of
involvement in a fraudulent act involving several lakhs of rupees. The
Home Secretary and the chief of the unit ( in the rank of DGP) made sure
that the commandant of the college faced the consequences for
recommending action on their favourite official. His vehicle was
withdrawn, telephones were disconnected, his personal staff was harassed
and his subordinates were encouraged to disobey. This continued until
the officer who found functioning impossible went on leave. He reported
back to duty only after he was transferred out. More surprising is that
such incidents take place in the open without any attempt to keep it
secret or discreet.
Professional pride is the panacea for the malady of self-interest in

professionals. Greating an ambience of professional pride is a sure way
of nurturing and promoting high professional standards and efficiency.
It is immaterial whether high professional pride creates high standards.
The fact is both are important to create a conducive environment of
professionalism.
India definitely needs such a professional environment in its police

force to strengthen its democratic traditions and the roots of the rule
of law. An organised effort is on in the Indian police to force its
members to fall in line at the cost of individual brilliance and
creative abilities. The policemen are starved of innovative steps. The
organisation follows the principle of nipping talent in the bud
insisting on unquestioning servitude. The talk of the top brass on
public platforms about the need to nurture excellence and the
outstanding qualities is a farce. Most leaders prefer status quo at the
peril of the growth of the organisation so that their interests remain
undisturbed.
For administering the medication, first, topmost police leaders of the

country need to be convinced that the police of present India are really
ailing with serious problems and the system really needs treatment.
WHAT AILS THE INDIAN SECRET POLICE

India’s approach to national security is always piecemeal
Incoherent and casual. Threats are countered with short-
Term responses which never fulfil the vital needs of the
country. Espionage performance is below the international
standard. The reasons are many but the important ones are
lack of commitment and an approach that is far from
professional.
It is significant that the history of the police of sovereign India

begins soon after the turbulent years of the second World War. The shift
saw an expansion in the vista of policing worldwide, the most important
being clandestine operations for national security. Covert operation
blossomed as a full-fledged institution and was recognised as a tool of
statecraft only during and after the second World War (Germany, the
Soviet Union and Britain before and during the war and the U.S. and
Israel after it perfected the techniques.
The establishment of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the early

Fifties from the remnants of the office of Special Services( OSS), with
an exclusive division to handle clandestine operations abroad (sometimes
domestic operations also) marked a milestone in the history of
intelligence.
Free India , in spite of its moral values and abiding faith in the
Gandhian philosophy of truth and honesty, found covert operations
indispensable for survival. Though attempts were scratchy in the
beginning India made significant breakthroughs in penetrating, moulding
and controlling the affairs of neighbours after setting up the Research
and Analysis Wing (RAW) to handle covert operations in foreign
countries. Its operations and performance in Bangladesh, Sri. Lanka and
Pakistan and to a somewhat lesser extent in Afghanistan, Nepal, Bhutan,
Burma and some of the Gulf countries are equal to the best in the world.
Its role in the creation of Bangladesh, containing the Liberation Tigers

of Tamil Eelam, checkmating Pakistan in Kashmir and controlling the
terrorist misadventures of international Sikh communities against Indian
targets have earned it worldwide accolades. This in spite of the fact
that the Indian secret police is a lightweight performer in the arena of
international clandestine wars and its overall performance is
unimpressive for the size and resources of the country. The reasons are
many.
The first is the lack of commitment to the national cause and ideologies
such as integration, democracy, secularism, nonaligned movement and
mixed economy. Another reason is the moral atrophy experienced by the
police after independence leading to a setback in the professional
approach. Postings to the RAW with opportunities for foreign assignments
have become an obsession depriving the job of all its substance and
spirit.
The other reason is political interference in postings and transfers of

the RAW officials. It is in fact political connections rather than
security screening and clearance and aptitude for clandestine operations
which decide the issue. Huge unbudgeted and unaccounted funds at the
RAWs disposal make the appointments highly lucrative. This is an
extremely dangerous trend in a security apparatus where commitment,
trust and absolute secrecy are vital and draw the line between life and
death.
LACK OF PERSPECTIVE
Clandestine operations require highly specialised skills, Ignoring this

need means compromising and betraying the organisation’s operational
efficiency and exposing the country to dangerous security threats.
Another important reason for the retarded growth of the Indian secret
police is the general lack of security consciousness in the country and
the inability to see and place the imperatives of a national security
policy in the right perspective. These glitches end up in security
breaches. India’s approach to national security is always piecemeal,
incoherent and casual.
It does not have a sound and well-conceived national policy. Security

threats are always treated with short-term face-saving responses which
never contribute to the real long-term security needs of the country.
The people who fought a mighty power to liberate this country from the
yoke of foreign rule just half a century ago have not bothered to start
a public debate on the subject. Indian security now is left at the mercy
of time and it is sheer luck that democracy has escaped the hungry
wolves waiting to prey on it.
Security policy is the essence and unifying factor behind all the
policies of most developed as well as developing countries. Whether in
foreign, defence or economic policy, industry, trade and commerce,
science and technology or human resource development, the policies are
all oriented to national security. Most developed countries have
exclusive super agencies reporting directly to the head of government to
advise it on, oversee and mastermind national security policies and its
operations.
The U.S. has the National Security Agency (NSA) doing yeoman service as
the national security advisor to the President and enjoys more powers
than the CIA. Israel and Russia have efficient outfits at the political
level to formulate their national security interests. Most developed
countries have created their own systems to mastermind matters touching
national security with the power to override the decision of other
departments. India is yet to learn its lessons from these developments.
The excessive concern for national security has led to the creation of
parallel governments and power centres in some countries. There are
instances of black acts being committed against the legitimate policies
of countries in the garb of national security. Pakistan is an example of
a constitutionally-elected government living in the shadow of fear of
its secret police. The Inter-Services Intelligence )ISI) has indeed
taken upon itself the responsibilities of national security.
LOYALTY, A POSITIVE ASPECT
In the context, a positive aspect of India’s poor concern for secret

interests is its clean slate regarding the existence of secret parallel
governments and clandestine power centres. It is creditworthy that the
Indian secret police has remained subordinate and loyal to its
legitimate authorities.
The field of operation for the security agencies continues to be

confined to traditional methods which ignore the needs of a modern
integrated approach in consonance with the national policies and
programmes. India cannot afford to treat its security concerns according
to the whims and fancies of the people who come to head the Ministries
and their political and personal ideologies.
India lacks a regimen of long range security programmes to make its

security operations meaningful and purposeful. It is lagging far behind
the world standards in hi-tech ultra-secret espionage operations. Its
secret police are yet to make proficient use of the country’s impressive
strides in satellite launches and other space innovations. Except
perhaps in the case of Pakistan, India is yet to fully utilise the
service of world-class mercenaries. In short, security is not high on
the priority list.
The state of affairs is even worse in the special branches or

intelligence units of the States and Union Territories. The former have
become tools of the ruling parties which spy over their political
opponents and the field situations. Law and order is pushed to the
background.
As far as internal security is concerned, they are rather ill-equipped

for the task in, manpower resources, hi-tech equipment, expertise,
organisational efficiency and motivation factors, save some routine VIP
security exercises which do not call for expertise. These exercises are
meant just to oblige and gratify political masters.
Their contacts with the news media, a vital link in intelligence

operations, are few and are mostly confined to local newspapers for the
purpose of disinformation and to keep track of news dissemination.
Occasionally, these contacts are misused to promote favourite
subordinates. The role of these special branches in providing skilled
recruits to security agencies at the national level has remained a
dream.
The institution of an apolitical agency with a permanent core group of

experts whose integrity is proven alone can change the situation. This
nucleus will act as the guide, advising the head of government in
national security matters. Efforts made in this direction are rather
sketchy, ill- conceived and half-hearted. It is high time work was done
in earnest to form this comprehensive agency.
VIP PROTECTION
In India, national security, for all practical purposes, is synonymous

with VIP security and the police refuse to look beyond protecting
individuals. This is because of the lopsided loyalties and aberrations
in understanding professional objectives and responsibilities and a
tendency to trade off professional responsibilities and services for
promotions. This explains the existence of the Black Cats, National
Security Guards, Special Protection Group and so on. While the safety of
national leaders is important, it is not the plank on which national
security stands.
The VIP security has become a public farce with all kinds of people
demanding and obtaining security classifications depending on the money
and power they have. They get the cover of highly trained police
personnel as a mark of their prestige and social standing.
All matters concerned with national security are highly sensitive and
should be treated as such. It should not be degraded into a mean
exercise for the benefit of a few persons, however influential and
important they may be.
Each VIP visit to a region ends up with the entire law and order wing of
the police force drawn out for protection duties, throwing normal work
out of gear. With the VIPs busy trotting around the country, it has
become a serious threat to routine police work.
posted by praveen kumar at 2:59 AM
RAT-RACE AT TOP AFFECTS POLICING

The British were the forefathers of the unified Indian police. They
created the reticulation of the police force for India with their own
designs and objects in sight. It was a force that met the needs of the
time. In an age of rapid changes due to the opening up of new vistas and
dimensions to life by inventions and discoveries in science and
technology, nothing remains quiescent. The scope, design and objects of
the Indian police underwent a basic metamorphosis with the transfer of
government to native hands. The process spawned a synod wherein
undemanding aspects of both the worlds survived to create a new police
culture. The distinguishing traits of the Indian police of the British
vintage like objectivity, apoliticism, commitment, discipline, quality
and high standards were discarded as peregrine and irrelevant in the
changed circumstances; and traditional Indian values like simplicity,
charity, wisdom, mutual respect, encraty and human qualities were
distanced as Indian to the police culture. The convenient factors of the
old and new worlds were chosen to warp a new world of police culture
while demands on policing were at the crucial stage in the creant years
of national independence. The cabal was struck by the Indian police
officers who rapidly rose in their career overnight to fill the void,
created by the resignations of their senior British officers in the
ancien regime on the eve of independence. The demand for creating a new
work relationship with native political leaders was a historical
opportunity to carve a new police culture in free India. The
incompetence of the then police impresarios, their greed, parochial
approach and self-interests spawned the wrong type of police culture.
They laid mendacious praxis to those lower by bending laws and
conscience to aggrate men in power with the myopic object of promoting
ain career and personal interests. The police became a lithe tool in the
hands of the power-brokers of free India. How can the police be
objective, honest, apolitical, committed and disciplined in such an
atrophy and how can it uphold the rule of law and justice in line with
its professional edict in such a circumstance?.
A fixation towards political masters at the cost of professional

uprightness is the most obvious manifestation of this organisational
character of the police setup. The symptoms are deeper at higher ranks
and reach their saturation at the rank of the chiefs where political
selections are crucial in appointments to the levels. Except in rarest
of the rare cases, every police officer ascensively obtempers and goes
sequacious to political masters as he comes nearer to the coveted
selection post. Two distinct types can be marked in this approach. In
one, officers take to subordination to political leaders as a convenient
policy from the very beginning of their career, and as a policy, make
themselves subject to the dictates of all political leaders. The very
concept of politics is sacrosanct to them and anybody in it deserves
their absolute obeisance. They find the germ of professional rectitude
in meeting needs of political masters and other political leaders. Any
talk of professionalism in the police ectogenesis to political relevance
does not make sense to them. Every state in India has a set of such
police officers who are generally meek and very popular with politicians
of any colour and succeed in getting favourable postings which ever
party comes to power. It is not an accident that these officers often
become intelligence chiefs and in most cases succeed to retire as the
chiefs of the concerned police organisations because of their easy
proximity to politicians and willing readiness to stoop to any level at
the behests of their political masters. Politicians in power need such
officers in jobs where lawless operations like tapping of telephones and
illegal operations are part of the game.
There is another set of officers who turn soft to politicians as they
reach the stage of being subjected to political scrutiny for being
selected to coveted posts like the chief of the concerned police set up.
These officers are generally known as strict officers and hailed for
their professional uprightness and competence from the beginning of
their career, which is marked with erratic rises and falls on political
whims. The public mark them as ideal professionals. But changes appear
in them as they approach the D-day of their career and they become the
best friends of political heads to corner selection posts with the zeal
of a new convert.
In an annual conference of police officers in a state police chief

lambasted his Chief Minister and Home Minister in his speech en face for
denying him free hand in posting of officers in professional interests.
The officer next in seniority to the chief, whose selection as the next
police chief was to be decided soon rose to the occasion and against the
decorum of a professional meet, contradicted his chief to state that it
was the prerogative of the ministers to post officers at their will.
This shocked the assembled officers as he did that while he was known as
a through professional and strict adherent to professional values and
ethics. His apostasy astounded the police officers attending the
conference who trusted him to up hold the values of his profession till
the end.
It is a common practice in some states of India to change key officers

of the police department when a new dispensation takes over the rule.
Changes in key position of the police department following changes in
political rule are a common feature in most states. This reflects how
the political leadership of the country sees the professional loyalties
of its police. This credibility of the professional loyalty of the
present Indian police is incredulously low even among the public.
Political leadership believes that all those in police are venal
commodities, who can be win over by throwing loaves and fishes. It is
convinced that most in the police are loyal to one or the other
political groups of the country and its leaders and these factious
loyalties within the police setup do make substantial differences to its
political fortunes. Ergo, the mad rush to place favourite police
officers at key positions tout de suite of taking over the
administration. Fractured loyalties of those in the police setup are
responsible for this triste affaire. It is natural for any to respond to
the state of affair and make hay while the sun shines. While political
leaders play some police officers in deliciis and not others, they are
only exploiting the Achilles’ heel of the organisation offered to them
on a platter and sharing the res gestae. The culprit here is the
perverted loyalties of the police. When the police play their priorities
well by perspicuously defining their loyalties in favour of professional
objectives of the police rather than myopically prevaricating to the
mire of personal loyalties against professional dignity, no more the
political leadership finds it feasible to keep its avizefull
pernoctation over the police to play one against the other. While the
police en semble are committed to their professional objectives, there
is nothing to the political leadership to choose from. What is termed as
political interferences in placements of police department is patently
the making of the police by their gratuitous personal loyalties and any
blame on the political leadership on this count is assez bien uncalled
and due to parablepsis.
DEVALUATION OF PROFESSIONAL QUALITIES:
The intelligence unit is the most abused section and its chief is the
most willing loyal subservient policeman available to political masters
in most of the police forces of India. Intelligence officers have a
responsibility to their organisational objectives and they ought to be
loyal to it and work towards meeting the objectives. But, misplaced
loyalties overturn the scope of intelligence units everywhere in present
Indian police. Intelligence units as a consuetude are seen as the
political handmaid of the ruling parties and their leaders. The
usefulness of the intelligence units as political tools is so pronounced
in India that the units are ascensively brought under the direct control
of the chief executive of the government from its traditional field of
the Home Department and as a consectary, intelligence chiefs are
accrescently becoming the prime advisers of the chief executive head and
shoulder above even the chief secretaries in states and the cabinet
secretary in the centre. The out-of-turn importance is a quid pro quo to
the lengths to which these officers go and risk their personal and
career safety and honour in indulging in all types of illegalities to
oblige the political masters, lllegalities and unethical practices like
telephone tapping and shadowing political rivals of the ruling party
leaders are only minor prevarications these loyal police officers
indulge in to keep themselves on the right side of their political
masters. Assessment of political trends and suitability of various
candidates in different constituents during elections and reporting of
political and other activities of politicians within and outside and
ruling party are now wrongly seen as legitimate functions of
intelligence units in Indian police. The zeal of police officers to
prove personal loyalty to the ruling political party and its leaders
often lead them even further. Though the loyalty of these police
officers to their political masters foot the bill for any encomium, it
sadly goes against all professional tenets of any police organisation
worth the name. But this is inconsequential to these police officers.
Professional interests lose all significance to them vis a vis loyalty
to powerful per procurationem self-promotions. Where loyalty to right
ideals is a basic tenet of the policing, loyalty becomes a venal
commodity to these police officers. The intelligence chief of a
particular state who was a favourite of the chief minister of the state
and retained his position as the chief of the intelligence in additional
charge even after promotion and posting to a higher slot, led a huge
contingent of intelligent officer and camped in Delhi for several days
to help his political masters manoeuvre for the Prime Ministership
during the turbulent weeks of unstability after the general election of
1996. The tragedy of such a perverted loyalty is the devaluation of the
professional qualities of the policing apart from financial implications
of such operations and the block they create in legitimate government
works. This is a fine example of sacrificing public interests at the
altar of self-promotion of few individuals.
Political leaders make best use of this Achilles’ heel in the police
setup. How low police officials at higher ranks stoop to be in good
books of political masters can be seen in some states by the concours
among the two important pillers of the state police setup namely the
state intelligence chief and the Police Commissioner of the State
Headquarters in front of the state Chief Minister’s residence early
every morning to have the first private audience of the Chief Minister
to themselves. This was a laughing matter in official circles some years
back. Though the hard work of these high profile police officers to rise
everyday early in the morning to pay their obeisance and report to the
chief executive of the state and their sedulity to their work in hand
have to be respected and appreciated, the issue is cannot they discharge
these duties sans breaching the pride and dignity of their ranks and
posts and without so obviously expressing their sequacious tendencies?
After all, they have a responsibility towards keeping the pride and
dignity of their ranks and profession, if not of their individuality.
SALVAGING OPERATION
The situation can be salvaged by clearing the cobwebs from the entrails
of the Indian police. There is a catena of self-motivated officers in
key positions in the police who unknowingly brought about the
degringolade of the Indian police in the post-democratic era. They
corrupted the police atmosphere, set wrong precedences, encouraged
self-indulgence, pulled down its no-nonsense tough image and reduced it
to its present cadaverous existence. These elements should be side-lined
to absorb men of probity to refurbish and rebuild the police setup. Only
really capable impresarios can pull the Indian police out from its
present fix.
POLICE AS SOCIAL SURGEONS

Police deal with social ills as physicians and surgeons deal with
physical ills. A surgeon incises parts of the body to set right wrongs
and remove dangerous growths from the system to save a person while a
police do the same for the society. Police job like the works of a
surgeon involves administration of bitter potions, prescription of
restrictions and incisions to lay foundation for a sturdy system. Like
medical profession, policing is a highly responsible function and ergo
needs to be bound by moral ethos lex non scripta to avoid misuse of
special rights involved in discharge of duties. Both professions involve
independent decisions in handling each case and exercise of infrangible
conscience in doing justice to it. The difference lies in the medical
profession mostly maintaining its pristine purity as a profession while
police as a splinter of bureaucracy being illaqueated by formalities and
procedures inherent in government functions at the cost of forthright
involvement and commitment immanent to a profession. The ineluctable
hierarchical order as the spine of policing and the concomitant
interferences from above bring a measure of incertitude and render
honest and professional policing nonpossumus by depriving field officers
their freedom in handling cases on dictates of the conscience. This
perforce adversely affects the effectiveness of policing and ipso facto,
the health of the society. It is the reason why in spite of sound
presence of the social surgeons, Indian society witness the
deterioration of its health de mal en pis each passing year.
TRUST OF THE PEOPLE
Physicians and surgeons have as much potentiality and opportunity to

damage as to save health. Because of their expertise and credibility,
surgeons have umpteen opportunities to use their tools and instruments
on people on the claim of restoring health. The whole process is based
on trust on the surgeons and their honesty. Imagine the situation when
the lot of surgeons is greedy and sans scruples, while the people have
no alternative to offering themselves for surgery to their hands in
times of need. None can be sure what would happen to an unconscious
patient on the operation table in the hands of such surgeons behind the
closed doors of the operation theatre. The whole situation becomes
hopeless when the whole setup is run by similarly profligate surgeons
and the precept that birds of the same feather flock together operates
to hold them in syndesis at the expense of any relief by appeals or
complaints. The harm done to the patient to meet the greed of the
surgeons would be pro rata to the latter’s immoral propensities. Synergy
among them may lead even to venal deals in human organs at the expense
of the health of the ignorant people. Their contempt for professional
skills and negligent work may tremendously harm the safety of the
patients. The situation in the field is certain to wreck the trust of
the people on the surgeons. The predicament forces them to rely on the
contabescent setup foute de mieux. The hapless position spawns a sense
of disillusion in people and they even resign to the situation as
helpless subjects. This exactly is the situation of the social surgery
by the police in India. The society has to depend for surgery upon an
epinosic organisation, which is inefficient, enrivon with quandaries,
mismanaged, enfested with scandals and above all, undependable. The
society, for its well-being, has to fall on an organisation with which
it tends to keep distance and thinks it indignity to associate, its
womenfolk consider as an insult on their womanhood to approach and its
children see it as an image of fear and silenced by invoking its name to
gallow. It is the predicament of the Indian society. On the one hand,
the popular image of the police in Indian psyche is that of a devil, of
an evil. But, it has to fall on the police for all of its social evils.
Though part of the bad image of the police is sheer myth, part in
quiddity is the result of wrong people and wrong concepts coming to the
centrestage in Indian police from a long time.
RELEVANCE OF CRUELTY
The similarly of surgeons and police basically is their hard means to

achieve the desired end- surgical methods involving incisive tools to
cut and remove unwanted growths. It is en regle as far as surgeries and
concerned. The tragedy of the police lies in de trop extension of the
hard means unlike surgeons to other aspects of life. The difference
between a surgeon and a police is that while a surgeon outside the
operation theatre is a gentleman every farden, unaffected by the
ambience, the hard approach renders a police apocryphal at the cost of
civil living and basic human nature. This is why the image of the police
is very low. The hard methods in police extend even to its policy of
human resources management at the cost of neoteric principles of man
management. The rule of thumb continues to be the bedrock of handling
human resources. Ruthlessness and cruelty are its principal weapons in
bringing subordinates and the public to submission. Human dignity is an
unknown concept in the police. The result sees motivation becoming a
casualty in the bedlamish system.
SADISTIC PLEASURE
The endless affairs with legal matters perhaps insensitise the police to
the problems of legality. This is evident in their hors la loi approach
to various issues. The police seem to think that end justifies the
means. The problems of malfeasance are common in the police. The mode of
approach of the police to man management proves this. No scruple is
shown in measures meant to bring a subordinate to knees or an accused to
confess to the offence, he had not committed. Third degree methods in
interrogations is a too familiar issue to discuss here. Though third
degree methods are universal in application in police investigations,
there are vital differences in their use in advanced and countries like
India. While utmost care and discreetness are employed in englightened
police forces of advanced countries in deciding whether a particular
individual has to be subjected to serve interrogations, where imminence
of the concerned person being an offender is a prime criterion and the
methods are used as the dernier ressort, Indian police like their
counterparts in backward countries adopt third degree methods in
investigation as their staple right over innocent citizens and fall to
it in the first available instant like wolves on their preys. It cannot
be gainsaid that there is a streak of sadistic pleasure in Indian
police. They think that third degree methods are de rigueur in crime
investigation. The sadistic pleasure finds expression in severity down
the hierarchical ladder at the cost of dignity and self- respect of
others down the ladder. It is a free-for-all field . Basic values like
mutual respect and courtesies are rare in Indian police. Ruthlessness
and cruelty are the ropes Indian police find commodious with. This
invidious stria is hardly the desirable attribute to which any decent
society wants to submit itself for any treatment.
LACK OF COMMITMENT
A ken of the extent to which the Indian social surgeons are committed to
their work and goals can be had from the fact that in a small department
headed by a Director General of Police, deputed from the police
department in a southern state of India, a criminal case of fraud and
forgery involving a huge amount was launched against some staff members
of the department in a police station after the misdeeds were unearthed
during an audit. The circumstances of the case normally warrant
departmental actions like suspension of the officials, departmental
enquiries and measures to recover the loss to follow the launching of
the criminal case. In this case, the department washed off its hands
after launching the criminal case as if it had nothing to do about the
fraud and forgery in its own organisation. No suspensions, no
departmental enquiries, no recovery processes. Even the criminal case
was just a front to save the skin of the people at the helm of the was
just a front to save the skin of the people at the helm of the
organisation. Advice from well-meaning officers in the department to the
DGP in 1996 to take the affairs to their logical ends by initiating
essential departmental actions as an apotropaic measure fell on dunny
ears. In addition, the police who were investigating the case were
surreptitiously advised by the DGP to go slow with the case till the
people involved in the case easily retire. This much about the zeal of
Indian police as social surgeons in tackling evils.
“Surgeon” is an abracadabra; the concept of social surgeon is pregnant
with highest ideals human mind can conceive. The application of this
concept to recognise the duties of the police is the highest honour the
society has invested the police with, and ipso facto lays sublime
responsibilities on the rough and tough little shoulders of the police.
Unfortunately, police suffer from alexia and fail to read the elevated
position in which they are held while recognised as social surgeons. It
is position in which they are held while recognised as social surgeons.
It is sad to see how the sacred responsibilities are not only frittered
away, but abused at will to the chagrin of the hoi polloi. The
consequence is that while the police is yet seen and called as social
surgeons foute de mieux, they are no more loved and respected as social
surgeons should be. On the other hand, they are misprised and distanced
for the apostasy, they suffer from their avowed path. Indeed the fear of
police is there because of the weapons and the muscle of power they
weild. In some parts of the country, even the rear is glidder after the
pelbeian has learnt the lesson that money can do any tricks with the
police. The cause of the degringolade certainly lies in the police
itself, in the type of people enter the service, their calibre, their
values and convictions and the professional atmosphere created by the
service. If the organisation and the people in it cannot rise to the
high levels expected of it and prove their raison d’etre, the reason
lies in its ephemeral self-interests ectogenous to the professional
values and ideals. Police as social surgeons perforce require
single-minded commitment to the cause of well-being of the society. It
is seld or never found in present Indian police. The society whose
well-being is the responsibility of the police, know it. The police know
it. The society is left to itself to mend its problems. Police work only
when there is gratification and while people with muscles of money and
power need help. This certainly is not characteristic of a social
surgeon, but of a social-wrecker. Sadly Indian police is becoming that
in oodles, the protector of and tool in the hands of rich and powerful.
The preposterous trend has to stop in the interests of the police as an
organisation and a profession, the society, the country and the
humanity. The key for this change lies in creation of right professional
ambience in the police system. The secret of creating right atmosphere
lies in right leadership and the burden of right leadership lies on
right convictions about the importance of police and policing as a
profession. The malaise of Indian police lies in lack of right
convictions about the importance of policing as a profession. The result
is that all types of wolves ab intra et ab extra falling on the system
to tear it from all sides and eating it. The wolves within are more
dangerous than outside. The ensure that no upright resistance breed ab
intra to the detriment of their esurient appetite and no professional
pride raises its head to topple their schemes of self-promotion The only
response of their greed is wrecking uprightness and professional pride
wherever they are traced. Such hawks in higher echelons of the
career-ladder succeeded in their schemes and the result is the Indian
police in its present wretched state. The salvation of Indian police
lies in breaking the vice prise of these arriviste and laying it in the
safe hands of the professionals steeped in the foundations of
professional pride and uprightness, to make the system acceptable to the
society as its protector and ‘ social surgeons’ true to the abracadabra.
PROFESSIONAL PRIDE OF THE POLICE

Better handling of the police administration will do away
with the ills of the police force writes PRAVEEN KUMAR.
The basic needs of police and policing are professional pride and a good
image. The police force capable of doing its duties are carrying out its
responsibilities with devotion and self- sacrifice. But it needs its
sacrifices and devotion to work to be appreciated. A good image entails
public cooperation and enhances the social recognition of the police
personnel. Pride and a high morale are necessary in manpower oriented
organisations like the police, particularly those which have to deal
with the public from a position of strength. Police personnel shamed and
humiliated in their career can never face the public and do good
policing.
The tragedy lies in police administration. Its vanity belittles the

police, breaches its pride, shatters its self-image and destroys its
good public image by unscrupulous and selfish interferences in police
affairs. Suspensions and disciplinary action are a common phenomenon in
the Indian Police. When no grounds are available for disciplinary
proceedings, they resort to unfair and indecent measures like
withdrawing vehicles, telephones and other facilities, denying
promotions, transfer to humiliating jobs created for meeting such
eventualities, keeping on prolonged compulsory waiting without a job
etc. These humiliations weaken their position before the public as well
as subordinates whom they are supposed to control and guide with the
strength of their leadership qualities.
ARROGANCE OF POWER
A factor responsible for maladministration becoming the abracadabra of

police administration is arrogance of power. The police is the real
power, the crux of the state
power. The police administrators weild power on the enforcers of the
state power. Power breeds arrogance, ultimate power, ultimate arrogance.
The sweep of arrogance is so strong that it has no patience for rules,
laws, codes of conduct, moral values, natural courtesies and human
dignities. The only goal of the police administration in the ambience of
arrogance is proving its invincibility as tout prix.
A serious lapse of police administration in India is its presumed virtue

of indifference to other’s predicaments. The compulsions of being led
deprive government officials the great human gifts like freedom of
thought, originality and creativity and drain off feelings and
sensibilities. The humble situation is spawned for government officials
by themselves by their zeal to conform.
This is the position in which the police administration finds itself.

The need of making virtue out of irresponsiveness leads to mendacity and
dishonesty. Normal human courtesies are unknown there. Evasion is the
stock reply for queries. Vanity is the hallmark. Approach to all except
higher-ups is always brusque and stroppy. Normal man-to-man interaction
is impossible unless one is capable of gratifying. Public relations is
an unknown concept, McGregor’s need hierarchy and such management,
concepts are nonexistent in their vocabulary and thoughts.
A CUSHY JOB
The police administration provides a good cover to meet long cherished

desires and is therefore considered a cushy job. A police administrator
like the Home Secretary of a state can avail for himself from the police
organisation all benefits inherent to the police job like the best
available transport and communication facilities and orderly services at
will. The police network throughout the country would be at his personal
service wherever and in whatever way he desired it. This is an
invaluable asset, for him and his kith and kin. In the name of various
studies concerning the police, he can visit foreign countries at his
will and convenience at government expenditure.
The prevarications of the police administration from the right path in

most cases is not even to achieve right professional ends. They mostly
are pure and simple means to self-grandiosity and personal gains. Show
them elements of personal grists. Files move fast. Discussions and
meetings are held day and night. Decisions are taken overnight.
Procedures are cut-short to ease the process. Ordinary situation turns
to an emergence. Administration becomes a hub of incessant activity.
Lots of energy and thought go to the process of administration. The
result is that work is done irrespective of the relevance and importance
of the work while more pressing and vital, but less remunerative works
rot in files for years.
Selection and recruitment of men in the age of unemployment and purchase

of heavy vehicles in the ambience of commissions play a pivotal role in
the administration of police and related safety-oriented organisations
like the fire force. Recruiting men in thousands and purchase of scores
of heavy vehicles at a single go in the name of expansion of an
organisation involves subterranean change of hands of crores of rupees
in a short span of time. It is a dizzy amount to be pocketed.
Decisions were taken by the administration for expansion of the

organisation with fresh recruitment of thousands of men and sub-officers
and purchase of scores of heavy vehicles. A police officer in a
sensitive juncture of his career who could be compromised was put in
charge of the organisation and the selection and purchase processes. The
setup worked out by the Home Secretary worked to his satisfaction. The
result was that the police officer in charge was rewarded by quick and
easy promotions. The organisation concerned saw rapid expansion.
Thousands of unemployed youths got jobs. Manufactures of heavy vehicles
got business. And the Home Secretary got what he wanted. Thus all are
happy and contented. This is how administration works in India.
Most ills of the present Indian police emerge from the malaise of the
morbid handling of the police administration at different levels. Be is
in handling of the body and shape of the organisation and its functions
of managing the spirit and the soul of the force, the police
administration can play a major role either in building or marring the
prospects of raising a healthy police outfit for the country. As of
today, police administration failed the country and its police by
indifference on the one hand and crass handling of the organisation and
its affairs on the other. The only solution to this serious malady lies
in rebuilding the police administration with people of character,
integrity, devotion, efficiency, ability and above all, deep insight to
human nature and its problems.
WHAT AILS PROFESSIONAL POLICING IN INDIA

Discipline, in the case of the police force, is both an advantage and a
disadvantage. It is an advantage because, if discreetly employed, it can
prevent undue interaction of the police with unwanted elements. It is a
disadvantage because the police, with its trained response, may find it
difficult to isolate itself from the behests of its political masters.
The first and foremost job in this background is to free the police from
the unhealthy influence of politicians of all hues by making it
accountable to an independent authority with absolute power to take
decisions. The authority should be a professional body with men of
proven calibre and quality who have reached a stage where they need not
sacrifice their convictions to appease those in power. It shall be
directly responsible to the legislature and function as an independent
authority like the judiciary, the Comptroller and Auditor General or the
Election Commission.
The recruitment procedure should be overhauled to ensure that really the

best from the job-seekers are roped in. Any interference in matters of
recruitment should be promptly and decisively resisted. Only highly
qualified officers of proven probity should be entrusted with the task,
the ugly head of bribery ruthlessly crushed and the unhealthy trend of
making recruitment a business checked. The infusion of good blood even
at this late hour is certain to repair the damage.
The jobs should be made attractive with good salaries and satisfactory
working conditions that will give the resolve to resist the bait thrown
by the criminals. Social scientists say that bribery is inversely
proportional to the financial strength of a social group. Therefore,
better salaries and congenial working conditions will definitely make
the police less sensitive to these lures. It has to be ensured that the
right man comes to the right job and that honesty is rewarded. An
unbiased assessment of the work and character of the personnel will take
the organisation in the right direction.
Those who are empowered to assess subordinates and their work must be
made answerable to prevent misuse of this responsibility. The creation
of a high-power core group of people adept at assessing men and
character may help to create a feeling of confidence and security and
inspire the police personnel to discharge their duties fearlessly. This
group should be made ultimately responsible for all career decisions,
for the development of the police, work assessment, job analysis,
recruitment and management of human resources.
It is unfortunate that there is no relation between an officer’s

efficiency and performance and his standing in the organisation. The
officers are so indifferent to the performance of their subordinates
that they are absolutely in the dark about the standard of work turned
out under their supervision. Another reason for this sad affair may be
that they are not qualified to assess. This situation leads to random
assessment and, in the process, talents wither and opportunities
overtake high-calibre workers on the hierarchical ladder. This can be
rectified by arranging motivation courses for police officers who must
be taught about the work they are required to perform, its importance
and how to discharge their duties. Policemen generally distance
themselves from all mental activities. Training must endeavour to break
this trait and coax candidates to open up their minds and reflect on all
matters before making decisions. In this context, it must be mentioned
that often the habit of reading becomes a casualty once a person enters
the service.
This negative approach to reading and thinking has resulted in poor

professional knowledge, particularly at the higher ranks. Work knowledge
is generally limited to what is remembered from experience and bits of
what has been learnt from books during training decades earlier. The
style of supervision in the police should be seen to be believed. All
order to subordinates emanate from a perfect void. The best that is done
is to hold a meeting of subordinates wherein the latter are allowed to
arrive at a course of action to meet a situation and the decision is
returned to them as an order to perform. The style of ineffective
supervision must stop if the aim is to achieve quality. The system of
overlapping supervision because of multiple ranks, where none really
discharges his role must be scrapped. A thorough overhauling of training
and the application of modern techniques would go a long way in mending
the situation.
The organisation has become top-heavy. In States where there were only
two officers of the rank of Inspector General for say 40,000 men and
officers about ten years ago, there are now nearly 20 officers of and
above that rank for say, a force of 50,000. What are these people at the
top policing apart from being a drain on the state revenue and a
nuisance to officers down the ladder by issuing conflicting
instructions?
Promotion to a higher rank serves no purpose unless it means a more

challenging job and a suitable man is, therefore, selected to meet the
challenges. But this is not the case. Posts are created to satisfy
vested interests. Most of these jobs often serve as places to forget the
pressures of family life. However, the same luxury does not extend to
the more unfortunate ranks at the lower levels, including the
constabulary. While vacancies at the topmost level are filled up by
promotions effected overnight, promotions at the intermediary levels
take weeks and even months, depending on the rank. It is years in the
case of the constabulary. There are cases where vacancies of head
constables and assistant sub-inspectors or sub-inspectors are not filled
up for several years. Many have retired without a promotion. Policing is
a job performed mostly at the lower levels with involvement stopping at
the level of the Superintendent. Beyond that, it is a supervisory task
and in a police force with no supervision to speak of, higher ranks are
simply redundant. Any move to expand these ranks cannot be called an
honest effort to serve the public. But that is what is happening.
The process of recruitment is even worse. Selection has become a

misnomer. It is random at best and high business at its worst. This
approach may leave governance and public life in jeopardy. Policing is a
highly sensitive profession and requires only specially equipped people
to handle it. It demands certain specific traits in officers which
cannot be learnt by any amount of training. The most evident symbol of
authority and power people trust is the policemen. In the circumstances,
the wrong selection can be fatal for the nation. India is deeply caught
in a mire. There is a price fixed for each rank of the police. How can a
recruit who enters service by paying a bribe be expected not to reap
returns? What can be his picture of the service that the enters? It is
absurd to expect professional policing from such a recruit.
The common aim in recruitment now is to complete the job without

inviting legal hurdles. Sometimes even rules are overstepped to cut
short procedures and do away with cumbersome work. Posts at the lowest
level but nevertheless sensitive, like drivers, are filled up
arbitrarily. Quality suffers as a result. This is equally so in
transfers.
Honesty, integrity and hard work have yielded place to personal loyalty
and usefulness for personal work. Those who do not come up to the
expectations of personal loyalty fall out of favour and are eliminated
from the line of command. This is one of the main factors for the slow
degeneration of the police.
The police is a sacred confluence of those who choose policing as their

profession and work together transcending their caste, creed, social
standing and rank in order to control crime and maintain law and order.
But this objective cannot be achieved when there is no common cause and
everybody works for personal progress.
The general reluctance of the Indian police force to adopt new ideas and
the ungainly handling of modernisation projects have resulted in its
losing the race with organised crime and syndicates. Modern equipment
are bought, but the personnel are not trained to use them. Thus the
gadgets gather dust and break down.
No government with weak police system can survive, whatever its other
assets. The police should be extricated from the clutches of criminals
and politicians to make it a professional outfit with objectivity and
commitment to its task. There is no point in beginning the cleansing
operation from the side of the criminals or politicians. It has to begin
from the side of the police by insulating it from the vile influences of
criminal wealth and political power. Once this is done everything else
will fall into place.
POLICE MORALE ERODED BY POOR
ADMINISTRATION
The police is used as a tool to check the interference of the law.
The administrators wield power which breeds arrogance. They
do little to boost the morale of the personnel or motivate them.
The basic ingredients of good policing are professional pride and good
image. A good image boosts professional pride. Good image brings in its
wake public cooperation and enhances the social recognition of the
police personnel.
True policing is impossible in the absence of the strength of pride,

responsibilities to society can be discharged only from a position of
strength. A weak police cannot do a good job. Pride is linked to morale.
Police personnel humiliated in career can never face the people from a
position of strength and do good policing. The tragedy lies in police
administration. Its vanity belittles the police, breaches its pride and
shatters its image.
The police administrators in this country refuse to realise the basic

psychological imperative of good policing; they crush professional pride
whenever and wherever it is seen raising its head. Sadly to meet
personal ends. Perhaps staff in no other government department suffer
humiliations as in police. This is true at all levels including the
highest ranks.
Suspensions and disciplinary actions are common; when disciplinary

action would include such indecent measures as withdrawal of vehicles,
telephone and other facilities, denial of promotions, transfer to
humiliating jobs created just for the purpose and keeping the person
waiting without a job. This attitude produces a weak and confused police
force with a low self-esteem.
The police force is a tactical tool that can be of immense help to check
the interference of the law. The police are aware of this aspect. They
know that nothing works as fear does. They now that the advantages of a
policeman out-weigh the risks of breaking the spine by whatever means
and that policemen so reined-in can be made to perform any job even at
risks to his own life and honour. This is why the administrators spare
no effort and lose no opportunities to beat, terrify and bully policeman
of whatever rank, status, and enlightenment, even at the cost of
professional pride.
SCAPE GOAT
An upright officer of the rank of Additional Director General of Police
of a State and a scholar in diverse fields was known to refuse to bend
against his conscience and this fact made him unpopular among his
superiors. While he was the Chief of State prisons in 1995, he addressed
his government about the tragic security lapses in a major prison in the
State headquarters and sent proposals to improve the situation. No
action was initiated on the report by the government.
In the closing months of 1995, a mafia gangwar that ensued in the State
capital led to the murder of a gang leader by a prison inmate. The
Government ordered an enquiry by the Home Secretary. The latter who
found the ADGP a thorn in his flesh found a golden opportunity in the
enquiry. The officer was removed from his position and was not given an
alternative posting for atleast three months. If anybody was to be held
responsible for the lapses in the prison, it was the government for not
acting on the report of the ADGP.
In this case, not only did the ADGP become a scapegoat for the lapses of
the government, but also an easy target for police officers who found
his integrity inconvenient.
Police administrators wield power over the state authorities. Power

breeds arrogance. The sweep of arrogance is so strong that it has not
patience for rules, laws, codes of conduct, moral values, natural
courtesies and human diginity.
An illustration of how low the police administrators of independent

India can stoop is provided by this instance, the likes of which can be
found anywhere in India.
A police chief of a State between 1986 and 1990, who had obtained
several sites from the government through false claims in the names of
his wife and himself and a spacious house in a posh area of the State
capital refused to occupy the police house allotted to him and continued
to stay in his own bungalow for the first three years of his tenure till
the end of 1989. He shifted to the police house and took up the
renovation of his own bungalow just a few months prior to his
retirement.
Rules required that the full guard provided to his at his own bungalow
be shifted to the Police House.
SELECTION DENIED
The Deputy Commissioner of Police in charge of the armed police force

committed the serious error of shifting one head constable and four
constables from the bungalow to the Police House instead of assigning a
new team to the Police House and keeping the old guard in the chief’s
house under renovation to keep vigil over the construction material.
This infuriated the police chief so much so that the Deputy Commissioner
was not selected for the vital All-India Service, not only that hear,
but also in the next ten years while his juniors superseded him. The
indifference, incompetence and corruption within the Union Public
Service Commission (UPSC) helped the process.
The UPSC in its perverted competence has created a new breed of

administrators in the police and other administrative classes. This new
breed is interested in nothing beyond meretricious schemes for promoting
its career interests. They only think of more perks, creating new posts
to improve avenues of promotion and fighting for parity with other
services. Thoughts about how the schemes would affect the police
structure in the long run never bother these people.
Newspapers carry report of how promptly and actively regional and

central IPS associations respond to all the decisions touching their
career. We never hear these associations taking up any cause in matters
purely professional- law and order, security or crime investigation. The
matters are left to the care of those down the line.
Administration is a highly specialised field requiring extra-ordinary

skills but the state of affairs in the police field is archaic.
Actually, there is no administration worth the name. There are no
long-term plans. No organisational initiatives. No growth and
coordination studies. The organisation takes care of itself depending
upon the need factors. As far as morale, motivation and mental
well-being of the manpower are concerned, the contribution of the Indian
police administration is absolutely nil.
Threats and suppression form the essence of manpower management . Waste

of human resources and mandays is the general rule. Quality, efficiency
and character are inconsequential. Assessments are unheard of.
Accommodating the desires of the higher-ups in official and political
circles and powerful people on a quid pro quo basis is the accepted
norm.
There is leadership crisis at the administrative level. Reasons for this

deterioration are many. The agency in charge of selection, namely the
UPSC is now manned by people unequal to the task. Restructuring the UPSC
with professionals of competence and integrity can tone up public
administration.
Administration as a service in spirit and governance deals with men,
money, materials and machinery through laws, rules, decisions and
directions. Administration, for the most part, is human resources
management.
The distinct culture and service conditions of the police, the stress
and strain of policing and the psychological factors throw up problems
unique to the organisation. This renders police administration a
specialised field to be handled by experts having insight into the
working conditions and the psychological pressures of policemen.
The responsibilities of any administration are two –fold providing the

body and shape required to fulfil the objectives of the organisation
within the limits of the extant laws and providing the right ambience to
boost the morale, motivation and above all the mental well-being of the
personnel.
The extra-ordinary nature of the police setup and its working conditions
render the latter responsibility a sensitive field warranting
specialised study and application.
The complex psychological factors involving policing in diverse social

conditions and social imperatives of a policeman’s life require
dexterous handling of affairs to promote morale and right motivation in
place of the rule-of-thumb approach adopted now. Unfortunately, the
present chiefs of the civil service are unequal to the task.
What is required is highly intricate organisational policy imbued with

specialised skills and insight of the highest order to inspire, motivate
and get the most out of the manpower at disposal. The involves balancing
many contradictions inherent in the human psyche. On the one hand, the
police force has to preserve its professional pride; on the other, it
has to be taught to accommodate in its character the instinct to obey.
It has to be tuned to be faithful to authority while its ultimate
loyalty must rest with its professional objectives and the rule of law.
The police have to be tough and fearsome to criminals and law-breakers,

and gentle and friendly with the public. They have to be the model
law-abiding citizens even while dealing with hardened criminals.
While they are accustomed to the interplay of ranks and status in the
rigid hierarchical order of the force, they should learn to treat all as
equals and exercise authority over people at the top level in society.
In short, the task of balancing these contradictions is the real
challenge for the police administration.
PRECEPTS OF POLICE ADMINISTRATION
The word ‘ administration’ originates from the Latin administrare and
administratum which would mean ‘ to serve’ or to be an aid to.
Administration in its pristine form denotes service or aidance though in
modern parlance it stands for management or governance of affairs. Non
obstante the metachrosis of the word, administration even in its modern
avatar is service and aidance in essence though from managerial level.
Administration even now is serving and aiding an objective or commitment
through suitable planning, organisation, supervision and control
mechanisms. It normally is a distinct field of activity while being a
part of the organisation en attendant and stands above the latter by
holding overall charge of the affairs. Administration manifests at
diverse levels with its lower strata rooted in higher levels of the
organisation. In government organisations, higher functions of
administration are invested in government at stratified levels while
lower functions are burdened on higher levels of the organisations. The
heads of the organisations join hands with the secretaries of the
departments and higher authorities in the government to run the
organisations. It is also in the police. While the police organisation
en semble is responsible for policing, the levers of police
administration at lower levels are handled by the police chief and his
staff while the home secretary in charge of police in tandem with higher
echelons of the government handles it at higher levels.
POLICE ADMINISTRATION
Administration, be it service or management, is immanent in

organisational operations of all levels. In police, elements of
administration are inherent at all supervisory levels beginning from
head constables upwards. Police stations as grassroot policing units go
away with a large slice of the police administration. So are district
police offices in districts and police commissionerate in big cities
with the unit headquarters as the apex body of police administration
within the organisation. The interim levels bridge the gaps in between.
The springboard of police administration within the organisation is the
state police headquarters in a state with all important decisions of
policing and police administration emanating from there under the
control, supervision and guidance of the government in the form of home
department and higher levels. The police chief ab intra and home
secretary and chief secretary in states ab extra form vital links of
police administration. The ethos and character of a police force are
shaped by these key figures of the police administration. Though
political leadership is there as policy makers and executive heads of
both the organisation and the government, it is these three
configurations as innards of the setup, control and guide the police by
administrative controls, head and shoulder above political heads.
A SPECIALISED FIELD
Administration as a service in spirit and governance in manifestation

deals with men, money, materials and machinery through the means of
laws, rules, decisions and directions. Of these, men form the most vital
ingredient of management and governance. This is especially so in
organisations entirely dependent on human resources to meet objectives
and goals. Administration for most part is human resources management in
a manpower oriented force like the police. The special problems of the
police setup, its distinct culture and service conditions, the stress
and strain of policing and the non a such psychological factors unique
for the organisation crop up issues unseen otherwhere. This renders
police administration a specialised field to be handled by experts
having insight to and realisation of the special nature of policing
conditions and the psychological pressures on policemen on the off duty
in the organisation.
ISSUES IN POLICE ADMINISTRATION
The problems of police and policing are inveterate in the contradictions

immanent to the organisation, its status in society and the nature of
job it performs. The organisation is primly stratified with a serve
hierarchical order and stern discipline to the boot, preposterous to a
free human nature. Police, perform the unpleasant task of disciplining
and using force against fellow citizens. The unpopular job does not bode
well to the psychological well-being and for leading common life in a
society that exoterically fear and esoterically hate them. The police
live in society in the ambience of sempiternal fear, suspicion and
hatred against them. There is no love lost between the two and no real
mutual respect. Such a living is not conducive to healthy mental fettle
of human beings what policemen are. Sine dubio, the status enjoyed by
the police as enforcers of the rule of law and the fear they inspire
among the hoi polloi are some compensations and solace for the malaise.
The tragedy is that these apparent benedictions themselves create
problems of complex social adaptations to make up for the imbalance
caused by their real social status nowhere coming near the importance
they enjoy in society as law-enforcers vi et armis. The embarrassment is
common to all ranks of the police. As constables of limited education,
social position and enlightenment, they are required in streets and
police stations to handle people of far higher social status and
standing from a position of strength. As senior-most police officers of
premier investigation agency of the country, they are required to
investigate, arrest and chargesheet men of the standing of the Prime
Minister of the country and similarly placed high dignitaries. The
position is not as easy and joyous as it appears ab extra. The strains
of such responsibilities preposterous to human nature and natural human
tendencies of respect to social stations cause can only be imagined to
be believed. Added to it, the feeling of insecurity bred by the
potentiality of wrath and revanche of highly placed people pregnant in
upright police actions further flummoxes the matter for the mental peace
of the police. It is easily said that policemen ought to perform their
duties en regle on merit. Images of policeman as a father shooting to
kill his fleeing criminal son, as a son arresting his erring father or
as a brother in pursuit of his criminal brother etc are mere fairy tales
invented for films. The fact is that a policeman cannot be a creature
abstracted from his surroundings and shut to natural human passions,
emotions, feelings and familial attachments. If did, he cannot be a
human being, but a mere robot, a lifeless machine performing police job.
A policeman is a human being imprimis and the human nature makes him a
good policeman. He sans human nature and its sweet failings cannot be a
real police stuff. He is not a mere robot to unwind in the blinkers of
professional duties and responsibilities. The police in field perforce
perform as robots against their natural human sensibilities and
sensitivities on orders from above to show results. This ingredient of
policing has great impact on the psychological makeup of the police.
Added to this, the unending oppression and fear of disciplinary actions
from higher-ups for a wink of an eye common in police makes the police
life suffocating. It is said that policemen at all levels live with a
sword of danger algate dangling over their heads. Ruthlessness is a fact
of man management in police administration. Human relations here are
slender and easily snap under the weight of job-related surquedry. The
biggest tragedy of police life is the absence of human concerns around
it. Endless interaction with ruffians inside and outside the
organisation deprives policemen their natural sweetness and gentleness.
There is no scope for inteneration of their mental makeup. Police
administration needs to take these special features of police life and
psyche into consideration in running the organisation. The need renders
police administration a specialised field.
A BALANCING ACT
Responsibilities of any administration are two fold-providing the body

and shapes required to fulfil the objectives of the organisation within
the limits of the extant laws and providing right ambience to boost the
morale, motivation and above all, the mental well-being of the manpower
of the organisation. The extra-ordinary nature of the organisation of
the police and its working conditions render the latter responsibility a
sensitive field warranting specialised study and application. The
complex psychological factors involving policing in diverse social
conditions and social imperatives of a policeman’s life perforce require
dextrous handling of affairs to promote high morale and right motivation
in the place of present crass rule- of –thumb approach common to Indian
police. What is required is a highly intricate organisational policy
imbued with specialised skills and insight of the highest order to human
nature to inspire, motivate and get most out of the manpower at
disposal. This involves balancing in police many contradictions inherent
to human psyche. In one hand, the police force has to be steeped in
professional pride, while on the other hand, taught to accommodate in
its character, the need of perfect obedience to the verge of servilitude
in a stiff hierarchical order. It has to be tuned to be loyal to
authority while its ultimate loyalty must go to its professional
objectives and the rule of law. The police have to be tough and fearsome
to criminals and law-breakers while it has to be gentle and friendly to
the plebeian. They have to be led to be law-abiding model citizens while
day and night deal with hardened criminals requires to break the latter
to submission. While they are attuned to the interplay of ranks and
status in the stiff hierarchical order of the force, they have to be
compelled to treat all as equals and exercise authority even on the
people at highest levels in society while performing duties. The list
goes on endlessly. The cardinal task of balancing these contradictions
in police is the real challenge of the police administration.
FIELD SITUATION
While police administration is a highly specialised field requiring

extra-ordinary skills the present police administration in India is
archaic at best and maladministration at worst. Actually there is no
administration worth the name save some mechanical motions and
unintelligent convulsions to provide body and shape to the organisation
as time to time responses to day to day challenges. No long term plans.
No organisational initiatives. No growth and coordination studies. The
organisation takes care of itself depending upon need factors. The
maximum, police administration in India does is controlling initiatives
and works o of the police by throwing hurdles to prove existence. As far
as morale, motivation and mental well-being of the manpower are
concerned, the contribution of Indian police administration is
absolutely nil. Police administrators believe that they have no role to
play in the morale and motivation of the police organisation. Threats
and suppression are the staple of manpower management in police. Wastage
of human resources and man-days is the general rule. Quality, efficiency
and character are inconsequential. Assessments are misnomers. Personal
behoofs are the centres of all decisions. Accommodating the desires of
higher–ups in official and political circles and the powerful people in
consideration for quid pro quo is the accepted norm of Indian police
administration.
A CUSHY JOB
Police administration provides good covers to meet long cherished

desires and therefore considered as a cushy job. A police administrator
can avail for himself from the police organisation all behoofs inherent
to police job like best available transport and communication facilities
and orderly services at will. The police network throughout the country
would be at his personal service wherever and in whatever way he desires
it. This is an invaluable asset for him and his kith and kin. In the
name of various studies concerning police, he can visit foreign
countries at his will and convenience at government expenditure.
Recently, a regional edition of a leading national English newspaper
raised a hue and cry on its front page for several days followed by a
flood of letters to the editor against a visit of the home secretary of
the state with a huge contingent of inconsequential police officials to
a few western countries, supposedly to study crime and traffic problems.
The newspaper called the intentions of the study apocryphal, the study
gratuitous and the foreign tour during the holiday season of those
countries without first obtaining the assurance of cooperation of the
host countries in the study venture as outrageous and cried for stopping
what is called a pleasure trip. Its hullabaloo proved infructuous and
the contingent completed the tour malgre tout. When the home secretary
visited foreign countries again after six weeks for the same purpose,
the national newspaper did not dare to make an issue encore.
WRECKER OF PRIDE AND GOOD IMAGE
The basic needs of police and policing are professional pride and a good
image. These are the breath of policing and oxygen for the lungs of the
police organisation. They refresh the organisation, its system and
personnel after back-breaking and dangerous policing above the
oppressive life-style in the police ambience. They infuse entrain to the
organisation, its system and the men to take on gauntlets in wait and
attend to with commitment and efficiency. Pride is the fuel of policing.
Good image is the air that sustains the fire or the zeal of the
policing. Who are not aggraced by appreciation? Police force is capable
of doing its duties and carrying out its responsibilities with devotion
and self-sacrifice; It only wants sacrifices and devotion to work
natural to it are appreciated. A good image boosts its professional
pride and adds to its sense of belonging. What else the society can pay
to the police for its self-sacrificing devotion to the well-being of the
society? The professional pride and the sense of belonging to an
organisation widely respected and appreciated by the public spur the
police to do better and better every time. The pride adds to its high
morale which is sine qua non for good policing and healthy discipline in
any police organisation. Good image entails public cooperation and
enhances the social recognition of the police personnel. True policing
is nonpossumus in the absence of the strength of pride about work while
discharging responsibilities to the society from a position of strength.
A weakened police organistion and its personnel put to aidos can do no
good policing . Pride is the root of morale. Commercial enterprises know
the fact and use the knowledge best to derive maximum out of their human
resources. Pride and high morale play decisive role in deciding the
quality and efficiency of work and discipline in the organisation. Its
importance naturally is very high in manpower oriented organisations
like the police, particularly those which have to deal with the public
from a position of strength. Police personnel shamed and humiliated in
their career can never face the public from strength and do good
policing. The tragedy lies in police administration. Its vanity
belittles the police, breaches its pride, shatters its self-image and
destroys its good public image by scrupleless and selfish interferences
in police affairs. Indian police administrators are too unenlightened to
realise this basic psychological imperative of good policing. The irony
lies in that, that they crassly indulge in exactly the opposite, that is
crushing the professional pride wherever it is traced raising its
majestic head in the police. Sadly to meet personal ends. Perhaps men in
no other government departments suffer humiliations for humiliations’s
sake as in police. This is true of all levels including the higher ranks
in police. Suspensions and disciplinary actions are a common phenomenon
in Indian police. When no grounds selon les regles are available for
disciplinary proceedings, resorting to unfair and indecent measures like
withdrawing vehicles, telephones and other facilities, denying
promotions, transfer to humiliating jobs created for meeting such
eventualities, keeping on prolonged compulsory waiting without a job etc
are the common scenario to face even by very senior level officers in
Indian police. These humiliations weaken their position before the
public as well as subordinates whom they are supposed to control and
guide with the strength of their leadership qualities. What leadership
one can have while he himself is wronged and humiliated from above for
no apparent reason? This is the atmosphere in which Indian police,
police the crime world. The consequence is a weak and confused police
force with low self-image, low morale, low motivation and servile
complexes sans confidence and public approbation.
ARROGANCE OF POWER
A factor responsible for maladministration becoming the abracadabra of

police administration is arrogance of power. The police is the real
power; the crux of the state power; the enforcer vi et armis on the
field, not on papers as most other government agencies are. Police
administrators wield power on the enforcers of the state power. Ergo,
police administrators enjoy the temulence of holding the ultimate power.
Power breeds arrogance; ultimate power, ultimate arrogance. This is the
source of the unamated arrogance of the police administration. The sweep
of a arrogance is so strong that it has no patience to rules, laws,
codes of conduct, moral values, natural courtesies and human dignities.
The only goal of the police administration in the ambience of arrogance
is proving its invincibility a tout prix. Neither the well-being of the
police administration nor the upkeep of laws of the country have any say
in choosing the means to achieve this end. Police administrators going
hors la loi for this vain goal is the rule in the country. A recent
example is a senior police officer in a state who insisted for
suspension or transfer of a subordinate after a criminal case of
forgery, cheating, falsification of records, breach of trust etc
involving misappropriation of about Rs.36 lakhs during discharge of
official duties was registered against the subordinate in the police
station by his department. The latter’s good connections in the higher
rungs of administration prevented any further disciplinary actions
imperative in such circumstances. The insistence of the senior officer
in writing for departmental procedures against the subordinate
inconvenienced the administration. The insistence of the senior officer
in writing for departmental procedures against the subordinate
inconvenienced the administration. The thinking of the administration
was that, that how a police officer at whatever rank can insist
disciplinary action when it has decided against it for whatever reasons.
It decided that the recalcitrant senior police officer had to be brought
around and taught to conform with its decisions, by legal or illegal
means. The machinery of administration ground is so hard that the senior
police officer found continuing in his position practically unbearable
and impossible. He went on indefinite leave, rather forced to do so. His
harassment was so acute that at one juncture, he addressed the head of
the government, doubting the mental well-being of the perpetrators of
the harassment and requested to save the department from the prise of
psychopathic tendencies of the concerned. The Chief Secretary of the
government after hearing him in August 1996, issued instructions for
providing the senior officer an alternative posting forthwith. The
police administration in a show of rare defiance, resisted the
instructions of the Chief Secretary till the latter’s retirement later.
It was only after the principal secretary of the chief minister took
interest in the case that files moved against the wishes of the home
secretary and the four month vanavasa of the senior police officer came
to an end. En attendant, the subordinate with criminal charges continued
bien chausse in his cushy job. The new Chief Secretary in the beginning
dove-tailed to the depraved home secretary against the sound judgement
of his predecessor on the ground that he never had an opportunity to
know the senior police officer. This is how police administration is run
in India.
HUMAN RESOURCES STIFLED
A serious lapse of police administration in India is its presumed virtue

of indifference to other’s predicaments and idee fixe to distance from
noble human values. The compulsions of being led and the sequacious
tendencies cap-a-pie gratuitously deprive government officials the great
human gifts like freedom of thought, originality and creativity and
drain off feelings and sensibilities. It is why common human sense
treats odd to find intellectuals poets, artists or genius among
government officials. The humble situation is spawned for government
officials by themselves by their overzeal to conform. An outcome of the
ambience is administration going heartless and mindless, dry and
irresponsive to the core to its surroundings. While arrogance of power
adds to this, the situation becomes worse. This is the position in which
police administration finds itself. The need of making virtue of the
irresponsiveness leads to mendacity, dishonesty and immunity. Finding
honest and dependable people there , finding people of character and
integrity, finding a genius or creative soul at any level in police
administration is like finding a pepal tree in a desert. Normal human
courtesies are unknown there. Evasion is the stock reply for queries.
Vanity is the hallmark. Ironically , these negative qualities are
accrescently pro rata to the heights in the ladder of the police
administration. Approach to all except higherups is always brusque and
stroppy. Normal man to man interaction is impossible unless one is
capable of gratifying. Public relations is an unknown concept McGregor’s
need hierarchy and such man-management concepts are nonexistent in their
vocabulary and thoughts. Efficient management of human resources is a
fool’s paradise to them. They find the greatest virtue of administration
in ruthlessness. In the process, human resources wither and gargantuan
wastage of manpower becomes a common phenomenon of the police.
BREAKING THE SPINE
Police force is a vital instrument that if brought on knees can be of

immense help to stave off the interferences of the rule of law and its
enforcers and help to lead a good and comfortable life sans the fear of
law and law–enforcers. Breaking and bringing on knees individual
policemen is a clavis to this end. Police administrators know this
secret as none else. They know that nothing works on police as fear at
whatever ranks. They know that the advantages of a policeman broken of
spine and reined-in easily outweighs the risks of breaking his spine by
whatever means and that the policeman goes to any extent even at risks
to his life and honour to gratify and pander to the needs of his master,
because of his sequacious job culture. This is the reason why police
administrators spare no efforts and lose no opportunities to beat,
terrify and cow down a policeman of whatever rank, status and
enlightenment though they know well that they are sacrificing the
interests of the professional pride of the police, its commitment to the
profession, efficiency, organisational interests, the interests of the
rule of law and national interests at the altar of their personal grists
in doing that. Service rules and jus naturale are arriere concerns to
them in exercise of their governmental powers to chevir this goal. No
normal human concerns nor common courtesies for fellow beings deter them
from pursuing their evil designs. The recent example is an upright
officer of the rank of Additional Director General of Police in a state.
A scholar in diverse fields, he is known not to easily bend against his
conscience. This rendered him unpopular to the police administration.
While he was holding the post of state prisons chief in 1995, he
addressed government about tragic security lapses in a major prison of
the state and sent proposals to government for improving the situation.
No actions were taken on them by the government. In the closing months
of 1995, a mafia gangwar ensued in the state capital led to murder of a
gang leader lodged in the prison. Government ordered an enquiry into the
matter by the home secretary of the state. The latter who algate found
the ADGP of his same age, rank and status an inconvenient candidate for
his esoteric urge of bringing police to submission. He found a golden
opportunity in the enquiry. The ADGP was immediately removed from his
position and refused any posting for the next 3-4 months though as the
state prisons chief, he cannot be held responsible for the security
breach in the prison, particularly while his report on the matter was
ignored by the government . If anybody was to be acted on a highest
levels for lapses in the prison, it was the home secretary for not
acting on the report of the ADGP. If it is the position of officers at
highest ranks in the police in the hands of police administration, how
precarious is that down the ladder, can only be imagined.
ROLE OF PERSONAL GAINS
The apostasy and prevarications of the police administration from the

right path in most cases is not even a malfeasance to achieve right
professional ends. They mostly are pure and simple means to self
grandiosity and personal grists. The fact is that police administration
seld goes to any length of initiatives and risks for purely
administrative reasons unless some elements of personal gains are
involved. As far as purely administrative reasons are concerned, the
communi consensu among police administrators is for letting the police
carcass boil in its own broth uninterfered. After all, who wants the
risks of awakening the sleeping monster? Somehow the police function,
and let it do so as long as possible. Who knows how the monster may
react while they loosen or tighten a screw or a nut here and there. Who
wants gratuitous risks? It is the reigning thought of Indian police
administration in normal times. Show them elements of personal grists.
Lo, colour of everything changes and risks become sine qua non of the
administration. Files move fast. Discussions and meetings are held day
and night Decisions are taken overnight. Procedures and cut-short to
ease the process. Ordinary situation turns to an emergency.
Administration becomes a hub of incessant activity. Lots of energy and
thought go to the process of administration. The result is that work is
done irrespective of the relevance and importance of the work while more
pressing and vital, but less remunerative works rot in files for years.
Selection and recruitment of men in the age of prolate unemployment and
purchase of heavy vehicles in the ambience of commissions play a pivotal
role in the administration of police and related safety oriented
organisations. Recruiting men in thousands and purchase of scores of
heavy vehicles in a single go in the name of expansion of an
organisation involves subterranean change of hands of crores of rupees
at a short span of time. It is a dizzy amount to be pocketed with little
risk. Decisions were taken by the administration for expansion of the
organisation with fresh recruitment of thousands of men and sub-officers
and purchase of scores of heavy vehicles. A police officer in a
sensitive juncture of his career who could be compromised was put in
charge of the organisation and the selection and purchase processes. The
setup worked out by the home secretary worked to his satisfaction. The
result was that the police officer in charge was rewarded in oodles. The
concerned organisation saw rapid expansion. Thousands of unemployed
youths got job. Manufacturers of heavy vehicles got business. And the
home secretary got what he Wanted. Thus all are happy and contented.
This is how administration works in India.
Most ills of present Indian police emerge from the malaise of the morbid
handling of the police administration at different levels. Be it in
handling of the body and shape of the organisation and its functions or
managing the spirit and the soul of the force, police administration can
play a major role either in building or marring the prospects of raising
a healthy police outfit for the country. As on today, police
administration failed the country and its police by indifference on one
hand and crass handling of the organisation and its affairs on the
other. The only solution on this serious malady lies in rebuilding
police administration with people of character, integrity devotion,
efficiency, ability and above all, deep insight to human nature and its
problems.
POLICING UNDER POLITICAL PATRONAGE

In a blinkered system like ours, where power and wealth are the ultimate
virtues, where power and wealth in themselves stimulate mutual growth to
the exclusion of all other dimensions of life, it is no wonder, the
people of this poor country succumb to the trappings of power and wealth
at the cost of all virtues, values, pride, dignity and human decency. In
an increasingly competitive and complex world where every day more
mouths are added to share limited resources, where the principle of the
survival of the fittest operates to its immane logical end and where the
basic needs of survival and decency can be assured only with power and
wealth, people naturally go all out to ramp the ladder of power and
wealth by whatever means and cost. In the process, justice and morality
become casualties and criminality raises its ugly head as an instrument
to achieve otherwise impossible objects. This is how politics and crime
knit together in the fabric of Indian public life.
POLICE AND POLITICS
The story of the police is somewhat different. As the catchpole of the

nation’s administration, the police enjoy tremendous power over vast
fields of human activities with responsibilities to life and death of
the hoi polloi as well as dignitaries. In this sense, the police is the
cutting edge of the state power and its ultimate bearer. No power can be
its own sans the police on its side as an executioner and loyal
watch-dog. This is why politicians felt the need for wooing police to
their side in their activities. The police of independent India has
become an easy prey to the power-baits of smarter politicians by the
reason of their failing strength of character and talent. Their greed,
unsound social background, lack of commitment to good values and failure
to partners in whatever politicians do or intend to do. They refuse to
look beyond their political masters with their dispensations of job
favours; and so law, justice, righteousness, professional ethics,
morality, decency, human dignity, common good of people, national
interests and even conscience, otherwise common to any human being, have
become invalid nonsense to them. The police, sans sound character and
personal integrity, is no more than a country dog which is what the
Indian police has become in free India. The politicians, inebriated with
new power, smartly brought these weaklings to absolute submission and
hold them on a tight leash to be their personal watchdogs and personal
gendarmes in requital for favourable job placements, undue promotions
and other largition from time to time. Nothing is valued higher than
this largess and its dispensers by the new police of India. It is how
the police was involuted in the conspiracy against decent public life of
India.
POLICE AND CRIME
It was a hop and skip for the police from the plangent world of politics
to the mysterious world of crime and the underworld. The police became a
weapon of politicians to bring about the subjugation of the crime world
to prise their resources for the political ends. They thus made good use
of the decreasing strength of character of the police in forging a nexus
between the police and criminals in furtherance of their own telos. With
a week spine to hold itself and hapless in the face of odds, the police
is only too pleased to follow the footsteps of its political masters as
the cardinal principle of policing. In changed circumstances, discipline
and subordination which form the basic connecting link of the police
hierarchy, lost all their shades of meaning and are interpreted as dunny
and blind subservience to those who have power, seeking personal
interests. And politicians easily led the police to the despicable cul
de sac of the nexus with criminals, the very people whom both are
supposed to control and bring to book for antisocial activities. With
politicians as the custodians of power en arrier to the hilt to support,
the police plunged lock, stock and barrel into the lucrative crime
world; the consectaneous wealth and comforts were in no way less sweet
than the hard earned money of law–abiding society. This is how the nexus
between the police and crime world was established.
CRIMINALISATION OF POLITICS.
Whom should we blame for this hapless position? Certainly not the
politicians or their auxiliaries like criminals and police who are
unfortunate by-products of the grind. They are created by the situation
arising from a system which is misfit to the people to whom it was
devised. The blame lies either on the Indian people who are impair to
the democratic system evolved for them, because of their unenlightened
and venal consciences which is so dim-witted that virtues like honesty,
service, patriotism, quality and excellence can make no dent on is at
all, or it lies with the political system devised for them which failed
to take their psychological makeup into account and ipso facto led to
the problem of maladjustment in national life. Otherwise, how can we
explain criminals and goondas winning elections with impunity even while
rioting and murders were committed at their behest on the eve of
elections itself. The fact is that the chance of winning an election
often is pro rata to the aura of a tough image built around the
candidate. It is these people whom the Indian electorate prefer to
invest with powers to safeguard their interests. Obviously, the Indian
electorate lacks of foresight and vision to understand the consequences
of its irresponsible decision. It is yet too immature to take decisions
about the interests of the nation and see how national interests are
closely linked to its personal interests. It is yet to broaden its
perspective to include the life of the nation as an integral part of its
own. Long term and rational decisions are alien to its nature. Immediate
selfish interests and a parochial outlook continue to be the driving
force of all its actions and decisions, whether it be on the matters of
national importance or personal concern. In most parts of India, it is
money, arrack, sari, threat, fear of landlords or the blazoning
propaganda of a candidate that influence it to decide as to whom to vote
for. How can the avenir of this country be safe in the hands of such an
electorate and its elected leaders? How can an indifferent and
irresponsible electorate provide honest and efficient leadership to the
nation? This weakness of the electorate has ultimately left Indian
politics in the heath of violence and manipulative extortions, with the
instruments meant to protect them mowing the field. Saner elements in
politics, who found survival difficile, have left the field, giving way
to the elements which are more suited to what is required in the field.
It is how politics has become a pit of junk from a class of dedicated
and virtuous leaders. The credibility which is the pith of any political
life is the biggest casualty political institutions and the percentage
of the electorate that takes the trouble of going to polling booths to
cast votes is steadily decreasing from election to election, It is an
open secret that an election is an opening for a candidate to invest
money to reap wealth, comfort and power for the next five years. And how
he reaps the wealth, comfort and power again is not a mystery at all. It
is corruption and misuse of public money. If he is ambitious and intends
to promote his career interests, there is no way out in the existing
system but to resort to pulling strings and pursuing other more deadly
methods, often with the active collusion of the officious criminals and
police.
POLITICAL PATRONAGE
The unhealthy nexus often leads to and facilitates other forms of crime.
Cases of rioting assault, kidnap, rap and blackmail, involving the
supporters or relatives of politicians, criminals and police in
furtherance of a political cabal are other usual forms of crime that
result from the vicious nexus. Often, criminals and police are employed
to create disturbances or inspire sensational crimes in furtherance of
political goals. The losses of life and property involved in the wily
schemes seld touch the conscience of either the politicians, the
criminals or the police who are responsible for these dastardly acts.
The political patronage and the nexus with police desensitize criminals
to the process of law and justice; they are thus emboldened to commit
more daring and ruthless crimes that endanger the life and property of
the plebeians. The police, in its links with politicians on one hand and
with criminals on the other, is in its new avatar as the protector of
vested interests with no more commitment and passion for law and
justice. It has become a discredited force, a willing instrument of
power-brokers in a ruthless and violent cabal of power-games with no
heart for the common man and the common cause. This is the requital, the
Indian electorate gets for letting its political system putrefy by its
nonchalance and irresponsibility.
CHANGED ROLE:
With the increscent involution of the police with glidder politicians,
the conception of the police about its own role has undergone a
large-scale change. No more does it look at crime control and
maintenance of order as its first duty. With this, the concern for crime
control received a setback and crime control and investigation have
receded to the last priority except when politicians are interested in
them for a specific purpose. Only crimes that disturb politicians foment
police to galvanic and meaningful action. Other crimes receive no
priority . The very definition of the gravity of crime is adapted to
suit the new concept. Those crimes which are tolerated by politicians
are no more crimes. The self-image of the police as ‘ a fearless arbiter
of crime’ is changed to a solicious servant in attendance at the
pleasure of a politician-master. This blunting of the crime card of the
police has made it less awe-inspiring and less deserving of respect from
the criminals. The police has more and more realised that criminals,
particularly those from organised syndicates are personal friends of its
political masters and it is no match for the criminals in terms of
wealth, influence and social standing. The men of the police see those
criminals on equal footing with their political masters and learn to
treat them with awe. They find it absurd to act with authority against
the immarcescible criminals who are too high for the small stature of
the police. It is unfortunate that the police of the present days has
never realised its infinit stature as a law-enforcing agent vis a vis
all others including criminals and politicians whom it is empowered to
search, arrest and take to court if they deviate from their rightful
path. Sadly, the trifling wealth and the concomitant “big-man” image of
others appear to the present police as more appealing than its own awful
police authority.
POLITICISATION OF POLICE:
The extant system of selecting the police chief is erratic at best and
motivatedly amoral that meets the political ends of the rulers at worst.
A police chief in a state was taken to court with his wife after
retirement in 1990 February for defrauding the public and a spastic
society by sale of charity tickets in name of the spastic society and
pocketing huge amount of money. This is the standard of people who are
chosen by politicians to lead post independent Indian police.
A POLITICAL INSTRUMENT:
In an atmosphere where placements and transfers are decided by the needs
and wishes of self-seeking politicians, no police can efficiently
function nor can it be free from the vice prise of the politicians. It
is not surprising that power-esurient politicians more and more grab
powers that are legally and traditionally invested with the police
department when the top brass lack the strength of character and
conviction. This leads to a position wherein the police department
becomes a chessboard on which politicians move their pieces to checkmate
their adversaries and win the political game in their favour. In other
words, the police sans effective leadership is becoming more a handmaid
of politicians by moving away from its sacred role as the guardian of
law and justice and protector of the society and the common man. The
credit of bringing the police from its height of power to the present
level of absolute submission should go to the superior strength of
personality of wily politicians who bent the police on their own terms
with selective use of stick and carrot. This police is not the police
and what it does is not policing in the proud sense of the term.
CRIMINAL TENDENCIES:
A Deputy Inspector General of Police infamous for his epinosic and
corrupt activities in 1982 while holding charge of Eastern Range in
Davangere in Karnataka desired a young Deputy Superintendent of Police,
under him marry a girl from the family of a rich arrack contractor of
his range. The parents of the young officer fearing undue pressure got
their son married in desperation to a girl of their choice. This
antagonised the Deputy Inspector General. His next annual confidential
report of young officer showed the junior as a liability to the police
department and misfit as a subdivisional police officer. He also
prevailed year after year upon other officers who wrote confidential
reports of the young officer to incorpse similar or more deadly remarks.
Most of them obliged and this bright junior officer ended up with a
series of unsubstantiated adverse remarks repeated time and again in his
annual confidential reports. All his appeals were never allowed to reach
the government. It is to the credit of the young officer that he
remained unbroken and continues in police service while his far less
competent colleagues have superated him on the career ladder and the
young officer was successively denied important postings though there
was not a single thing in his career to justify such a treatment.
Undeterred by the unjust scorn heaped of him by refusing promotion in
preference to his less qualified and less competent juniors, he later
addressed the chief secretary of the state government not to consider
him any more for the promotion. He took this unprecedented autophagous
decision in utter contempt of the corrupt and immoral departmental heads
and government functionaries who crushed his career prospects.
There is a case of a Director General of Police in charge of Crimes and

Special Units in 1987 in a Southern State in India who as head of the
Food and Civil Supplies Enforcement cell of the state under a Director
was accustomed to getting free supply of quality rice, sugar, pulses and
other commodities from traders to his house through the latter
organisation. The new Director of the organisation in 1987 in the rank
of Superintendent of Police failed the Director General of Police by his
principled stand in this regard. This enraged the latter to the extent
of hounding the young Superintendent of Police and seeking opportunity
to publicly humiliate him. He followed the young officer wherever the
latter went for raid hoping that he would get some opportunity to fix
the latter. When all the efforts failed, the Director General of Police
decided as the dernier ressort to play a drama of searching the
Superintendent of Police in public before invited press and public in an
induced case of trapping on suspicion while the latter was returning
from raids in northern parts of the state, depending his calculations
entirely on the humiliation engendered by the publicity of such
suspicions and searches by a very senior officer coram populo. However,
the cabal of the senior officer came to nought and the Superintendent of
Police, was saved from the gratuitous humiliation in public while
inscience of the welcome set for him on the way by his senior. The
Superintendent of Police reached back state headquarters through another
route that night. It is of interest to note that the Director General of
Police who stopped so law in his police career was posted as an advisor
to the Governor of North-East state during President’s rule after a few
years, postliminary to his retirement from police service. This is the
calibre and integrity of extant Indian Police Service. This is the
reason why Indian society prefer tolerating social maladies to
approaching police manned by such people, devoid of any decency,
objectivity and fairplay, both in private and public life.
As corruption takes control and spreads to all strata of the force,

upright elements in the force become a minority and also forfeit coveted
positions in the organisation as inconvenient candidates. They are
scorned as removed from ground realities and detested and avoided as
moles in the mainstream. Their honest and professional approach becomes
a disaster and unpopular everywhere. Their courage in face of odds loses
character amidst popular sound ad fury of the misinformed. Vested
interests inside and outside the police let loose false propaganda and
spread distorted versions of events against such officers and suborn
character assassination to keep own reputations on right sides. The
Situation becomes really distressing when superior officers partake in
the game on the side of vested interested for consideration and join
hands in an unholy alliance to bend and silence the upright among them.
Taking recourse to unfair and illegal means to crush upright officers is
also not uncommon. Though courts of law can theoretically protect
against such harassments, expenses, time and uncertainties involved and
the history of court judgements being dodged or rendered ineffective by
administrative sleight, render the protection meaningless and force the
upright officer to face all humiliations and losses in silence or yield
to the pressures. It is to the credit of Indian police that it has great
officers who withstood all slights without yielding to pressures.
It is an irony that the political leadership which supposed to take the

lead of reconstructing India is colluding for mutual selfish ends with
the police which is supposed to be the tool of the reconstruction and
thereby strike at the foundation of the strength and orderliness of the
country. Every passing year sees a new phase and a new trend in this
nasty connection between the important players of the national
reconstruction to take the country by some miracle at the last moment.
As the people become more and more attuned to the nefarious nexus and
resign to the assuefaction, the players become more and more bold with
the passing years and go with their nasty collusion at the cost of the
nation’s interest with impunity for mutual relief and benefits by
subornation.
CRIMINALISATION OF POLICE
Politicians, criminals and the police-the troika that is taking
the country towards total chaos and ruin.
Organised violence is so much a part of Indian politics that all

politics parties have created youth and volunteer wings to accommodate
young hoodlums as a fighting and street-smart force to be used when
violence is needed.
Those who sand out in courage and toughness rise fast and reach the top
and today a very high percentage of Ministers in the Indian Government
are these people.
It is ironical that politicians, whose help criminals sought to save

themselves from the police, brought the police and criminals closer to
each other, building a bridge between them. The understanding reached
between criminals and the police is to a great degree responsible for
criminalising Indian public life and blunting the effectiveness of the
police.
Though the nexus between criminals and the police is not a new
phenomenon, what was once an exception has now become the rule and what
was the rule once has become the exception. Today criminals on the one
hand overawe a weak police force with their connections with powerful
politicians and lure the police with easy money and comfort on the
other, thus tilting the balance to their advantage.
POLITICAL MISHANDLING
Though criminals play their political cards with adroitness, their real
aim is to lessen the pressures of the police on themselves.
If some are born criminals, some choose the path of crime consciously
and some others are constrained to follow it. While faulty financial and
social policies forged by short-sighted politicians are responsible for
forcing many helpless people to a life of crime, these same policies
often drive sensitive people to revolt and to embrace terrorism and
violence.
Naxalisim, Sikh terrorism, the ULFA movement, Kashmir separatism, Hindu

and Muslim militancy and even the sympathy in India for the LTTE cause
are direct results of political mishandling of national issues.
India has seen isolated political attempts in the past to save people
from the clutches of crime and to rehabilitate them. The famous Chambal
experiment initiated by the late Jaya Prakash Narayan had some success
in spite of the machinations of certain politicians in the area.
Not that politics is all bad. It is, by definition, governance of the

State by popular leadership. The malaise of today’s politics lies in its
tilt to populism at the cost of leadership and more dangerously,
populism is being considered an investment to earn returns in multiple
proportions. Nothing, it appears, means as much to the Indian electorate
as money to prod them to cast their votes for a particular candidate.
VICIOUS CIRCLE
The history of independent India makes it clear that honesty,

patriotism, quality, service, excellence and even charisma have become
casualties vis a vis money and power on the Indian election stage. In
this situation, political poser is equated with electoral popularity,
which in turn is equated with money and power, which can be had only
though political patronage.
The vicious circle has helped to create a class of extortionists who

manipulate the passive public. Politics too has its honest and patriotic
people who are committed to the welfare of society. But, sadly, they are
caught up in a system which does not let them come to prominence unless
they come terms with it and adopt the venal proposition of wining
elections to make money to win the next election.
Only those who correctly grasp the inner dynamics of this and adapt to
its mechanics can hop to make any headway. Others are bound to sink.
When the system itself made the election a venal mechanism, corrupt
practices that rope in criminals and police are bound to follow.
It can be categorically said that the business of crime cannot survive

anywhere if politicians and the police join hands to bring the crime
world to heel. But alas, this is not to be in a world of opportunist
politicians and a corrupt, weak, police force both with an eye on the
spoils of the crime. The police force is the weak link in the troika of
power-brokers consisting of politicians, criminals and the police. It
functions as an instrument politicians use to bring criminals to them.
The role of the police as a law-enforcing agency and its hold over
criminals makes it a handy instrument for politicians to use.
SAD COMMENTARY
The police is the executioner and odd-job boy of the Government. This
image of the police is effectively made use of by politicians for all
conceivable personal and official purposes. While low-ranking police are
used as bodyguards, gunmen, messengers, watchmen etc, high-ranking
police officers are used for the same jobs at higher levels.
It is a sad commentary on today’s police force that while low-ranking

police do these jobs as an unavoidable duty, high-ranking officers
compete and fight among themselves to attend to the odd jobs of their
political masters. This they do, even when they are fully aware of the
criminal antecedents and police histories of some of their benefactors.
Jobs are judged for importance in the police force on their

potentialities for illegal money from crime. And jobs with potential for
such gains are most sought after and are often paid for in lakhs. This
is considered an investment. which will earn many times more in a short
period of time.
Many other jobs, on the other hand are known as punishment postings and
are largely detested. These jobs have no potential for illegal earnings.
It goes without saying that judging jobs on the basis of the challenge
or the opportunity for service that they provide is a thing of the past.
It is the crime world that decides the importance or otherwise of
different police jobs and in actual fact controls the type and calibre
of officers in each job.
In other words, it is criminals who invisibly control the police rather

than the police controlling the criminals. This reversal of function has
a lot to do with the low morale of the present Indian police.
Its members find themselves at the mercy of criminals whom they are
supposed to bring to book. The police is no longer confident that it is
mentally and organisationally equipped to do its job.
Increasingly powerful and modernised crime syndicates have made a farce

of crime control by the police. Many factors place the police at
disadvantages. Its growth has not kept pace with population growth. It
is also at a disadvantage as far as communication, transportation and
weaponry are concerned as criminals have the best of all these.
INCOMPETENT LEADERSHIP
Consequently, police fatalities in encounters with criminals and

terrorist groups are increasing. As a result the police in India is no
longer keen to intrfere with the activities of the underworld. The
understanding between criminals and the police is that both will confine
themselves to their respective fields a and avoid embarrassing each
other.
The police is paid for its passiveness while stray troublemakers are
silenced. The Indian police is sane enough to quickly realise that its
interests lie in silence while entangling with the crime world may
invite a host of complications.
The responsibility for the present state of the Indian police rests
solely on its incompetent leadership rather than on anything else.
Unimaginative planning uninspiring guidance and lack of leadership and
conviction in the top police ranks has led to utter chaos. Dangerously
ineffective recruitment policies, poor training programmes, misuse of
the facilities of confidential assessment of subordinates and the
degeneration of control and supervision machinery have resulted.
The present Indian police force is utterly unmotivated and police jobs
are considered only as devices that provide rank, power, social status,
sundry comforts and a pension. How can the people of India depend upon
this sort of police force for security, protection and law and order?.
It is a fact that Indian public life is a vast field of criminal
activities and politicians and police, though the custodians and
protectors of Indian public life, from part of the crime world. However,
knowledge of the involvement of politicians and police in this nasty
world stirs the public conscience for the reason that they are supposed
to be the people on whom the public relies to save them.
CRIME AND NATIONAL ECONOMY

A word about the effect of the nasty nexus between politics, crime and
police on the national economy.
Unity gives strength. It is true about this nasty nexus also.
The only telos of the nexus is gain by synergy, which brings confidence
and courage to the troika in its nefarious activities, thereby inducing
it to more daring and innovative criminal activities.
This results in proliferation of crime is illegal gain and the incidence

of crime is directly related to increase in black money in the national
economy, the proliferation of crime invariably results in inflation and
the weakening of the national economy.
More dangerously, it results in polarisation of the society into

criminal rich and honest poor, and destroys the country’s moral fabric.
The increasing incidence of easy money, material comforts and political

power of the criminal rich ultimately leads to internal strife and
popular terrorism.
The indulgence of the rich and powerful in crime popularises criminal

activities by bringing an aura of status to them and negating all
inhibitions in the popular mind.
Society easily accepts the example of the wealthy and powerful for
making an easy buck to lead comfortable lives in the world where life is
becoming increasingly difficult because of the spurt in black money,
caused by proliferation of crime.
While decent life becomes impossible by honest methods, the need of

survival forces honest citizens to accept crime as a way of life as the
last resort. This would be where politicians, criminals and police lead
the country.
Easy money and easy wealth have a tendency to inflate. Criminals tend to
spend lavishly. This ends up in a spurt in prices of land, buildings and
essential commodities, while honest men have to toil hard for an extra
quarter.
Crime begets money, and money begets more money, and more money gets
power, comfort and everything. In the crush, the honest man is lost
forever. The ocean of criminal wealth around him, which is beyond even
his wildest dreams, frustrates him and ravages his sense of morality and
righteousness.
It turns him violently against all human values and decency, leading him
to a world of crime and violence. It is what we have seen in Punjab,
Kashmir, Assam, in faraway Sri Lanka or even in Naxalism, where it is
disguised as political ideology.
It is an irony that politicians and the police, who create the demons,
fall to the bullets of the grievously hurt, self-righteous, once
innocent people. It is said that even the dacoits in Chambal are
symptomatic of this social and economic malady.
It is true that crime cannot be eliminated from any society as the

tendency to commit crime is ingrained in human nature. However, crime
can be suppressed by appropriate restraints. What restraints and how
they are to be applied are ironically decided by politicians and the
police.
If they come out of their indulgent interests to commit themselves to

their professional objectives, they can certainly save India from the
present predicament.
Not that every politician and very policeman can come out to achieve
this noble task, but there certainly are noble elements yet surviving as
exceptions among them, who should take up cudgels in favour of the
Indian polity and sacrifice their lives and careers, if necessary, to
make the renaissance of Indian police and Indian public life possible.
The question yet to be posed is: Will the inveterate vested interests
let these sacrifices bear fruit? Let us hope for the best.
HOW CRIME AFFECTS NATIONAL LIFE

No criminal can take lightly the need for political patronage in running
his crime syndicate. Be they smuggling syndicates, gambling houses,
narcotics dealers or plain hoodlums, the only way to survive is to have
comfortable political protection at the right levels. The crime
syndicates en revanche, pay a good percentage of their criminal gain to
the protectors. Thus, it is an arrangement to mutual advantage. The
crime world also provides hoodlums as volunteers to perform challenging
tasks during the election campaigns of their political patrons, apart
from liberally financing these campaigns. How can a politician, after he
gains power with the help of a criminal, ever let down the criminal?
This symbiosis of politicians and criminals which has emerged from the
extant Indian political system is the root cause of all the
complications.
The very fact that politicians are prepared to risk their reputations
rather than distance themselves from the crime world, shows how highly
the world of crime is regarded by the politicians in their scheme of
things. Politics and crime have become the tow faces of the same coin in
the present state of affairs and a saying goes that there cannot be
politics without crime and no crime without politics. In the present
Indian situation, it is true that the lotus of politics can blossom only
in the offal of crime.
UNIVERSALITY OF CRIME
On ultimate analysis, crime is a universal phenomenon. All living being

are criminals in varying degrees. Criminal thought is a part of the
natural function of a healthy mind as is the moral restraint that
prevents the criminal thought from being acted upon. External restraints
brought about by the fear of law, custom and adverse reaction reinforce
the inner restraint to prevent the committing of crime. However, as the
force of external restraints weakens for diverse reasons and the
proportion of gain to be made in committing a crime overweighs the risks
involved in the balance sheet of the operation, the lure of crime
increases and the deed is done. It is social situation which controls
the external restraints to make committing a crime an asset or a
liability and thereby decides the proliferation or suppression of crime
with human nature being what it is always. Criminals are criminals
because society gives them easy openings to thus meet their needs.
Politicians love to befriend criminals rather than bring them to book
because the society they live in makes their lives comfortable with
criminals as friends rather than as adversaries. Policemen find the
crime world sweeter because it is how things stand for them. The remedy
for the proliferation and endearment of crime lies in changing the
social dynamics to make crime a liability to criminals and criminals a
liability to politicians and the police. In the existing nexus of
politics, crime and police, crime is an asset to criminals and criminals
are an asset to politicians and police. Criminals should not be
construed as a separate block of citizenry. They are a cross-section of
people from all fields of life who have moved beyond a commonly accepted
degree in their criminal tendencies. Criminality may be prolific in
certain civilised fields like commerce and industry in the form of tax
evasion, violation of foreign exchange regulations, hoarding etc; such
crimes are generally not taken seriously in spite of the public
awareness of the crimes, with the social standing of the criminals
remaining unaffected. Government servants too come under this category
of criminals because of the unconfined corruption in public life. It is
a fact that Indian public life is a vast field of criminal activities
and politicians and police, though the custodians and protectors of the
Indian public life. Form part of the crime world. However, knowledge of
the involvement of politicians and police in this nasty world stirs the
public conscience, for the reason that they are supposed to be the
people on whom the public relies to save them. But, it cannot be because
they are also part of the society which makes public life a nasty affair
and nourishes it.
CRIME AND NATIONAL ECONOMY
A word about the effect of the nasty nexus between politics, crime and
police on the national economy. Unity gives strength. It is true about
the nasty nexus also. The only telos of the nexus is gain by synergy,
the synergy which brings confidence and courage to the troika in its
nefarious activities, thereby inducing it to more daring and innovative
criminal activities. This results in proliferation of crime, a part from
affecting the quality of crime by opening up new avenues for operation.
As the ultimate end of all crimes in illegal gain and the incidence of
crime is directly related to increase in black money in the national
economy, the proliferation of crime invariable results in inflation and
the weakening of the national economy.
More dangerously, it results in a polarisation of the society into

criminal rich and honest poor and destroys the country’s moral fabric.
This increscent incidence of easy money, material comforts and political
power of the criminal rich ultimately leads to internal strife, emeute
and popular terrorism.
POLITICISATION OF CRIME
The overworld is just the tip of the real, raw world. There are more
things hidden in this world than that are seen. This is soon realised by
opportunist Indian politicians who seize the first available instance to
enlist the support of criminals and underground operators for their
nefarious designs. This is turn is a god-sent benison for criminals to
restore their lost credibility and social standing with the help of
their association with the custodians of power, apart from the security
and protection from the police that ensues from the association. They
promptly grab the opportunity to their advantage and show how useful
they can be to politicians in their career-promotion designs and
wreaking of personal vendettas. The experience and professionalism of
criminals is handy to politicians to execute their hasty operations
without attracting the stigma attached to them.
The vast army of criminals has become a ready resource to them for use
whenever need arises. This has given a sense of confidence and security
to politicians, who are otherwise vulnerable in their highly uncertain,
challenging and competitive environment. Often politicians have so much
relied on criminals that the latter have become their most trusted
lieutenants even getting elected to legislature with their help and
blessings. There have been instances in India, where prominent
politicians have refused to disown their notorious criminal friends in
public even after reaching the vertex of their political career. This
shows the sway held by criminals over politicians in the Indian
situation. It is a fact that no syndicate of organised crime in small
and big cities anywhere in the world can survive even for a day without
political patronage. Ergo, all syndicates of organised crime and their
menace are the direct outcome of the internchant nexus between
politicians and criminals, indeed with the police as bystanders.
SOCIAL POLARISATION
The indulgence of the rich and powerful in crime popularises criminal

activities by bringing an aura of status to them and negating all
inhibitions in the popular mind. Society easily accepts the example of
the wealthy and powerful for making an easy buck to lead comfortable
lives in the world where life is becoming increasingly difficult because
of the spurt in black money, caused by the proliferation of crime. While
decent life becomes impossible by honest methods, the need of survival
forces honest citizenry to accept crime as a way of life as the last
resort. This would be where politicians, criminals and police lead the
country.
RESTORING CREDIBILITY TO CRIME INVESTIGATION
It is the national character of the CBI that makes it stand head and
shoulders above the myriad crime investigation departments. But does
the CBI, in its present form, fully qualify to be a premier
investigating authority? The answer is, no. A statutory panel comprising
(retired) members of the judiciary may help restore the dignity of the
institution.
The last decade of this century sees the Central Bureau of Investigation
(CBI) becoming the Indian version of the U.S. Federal Bureau of
Intelligence(FBI) headed by J.Edgar Hoover in the middle of the century
With one difference.
The FBI became a key component and much feared public institution,
thanks to the open aggressive moves of its energetic Director, while the
CBI gained notoriety as a pawn in the political game of chess used to
bring rivals down on their knees. The trend altered the judiciary which
became active.
The CBI, closely watched by the judiciary, had to discharge its
professional responsibilities and this saw many skeletons in the
cupboard tumbling. The organisation, in the process, shed its meekness
against powerful politicians and proved it was a force to reckon with.
Being the highest authority of the country in crime investigation, the

CBI must contain the best investigation brains vested with the power to
execute the work.
Personal attributes such as probity and professionalism are essential.

But does the CBI meet all these needs?
The seventh Schedule of the Constitution has the police and public
order, except for the deployment and use of forces of the Union, under
the State List, and criminal law, criminal procedure, administration of
justice and judicial proceedings under the Concurrent List.
The Central Bureau of Intelligence and Investigation figures in the

Union List. The arrangement provides for a separate bureau of
investigation. The legal authority of the CBI is defined by a short
six-section Act of 1946 titled “Delhi Special Police Establishment Act,
1946” which provides for the constitution of a special police force by
the Central Government for the investigation of notified offences in any
Union Territory and in any area in a State where the jurisdiction of the
police force is extended by the order of the Central Government on the
consent of the State Government.
The last section of the Act states the special police force cannot
exercise its powers in an area without the consent of the Government of
that State. The special police force enjoys all the powers, duties
privileges and the liabilities of the police officers of an area in the
investigation of the offences committed there.
The superintendence of the special police force lies with the Central
Government and the administration with an officer whose grade is on par
with State police chief.
The preamble of the Act speaks about the need for the constitution of “
a special police force in Delhi for the investigation of certain
offences in the Union Territories and to make provision for the
superintendence and administration of the said force and for the
extension to other areas of the powers and jurisdiction of the members
of the said force in regard to the investigation of the said offences”.
It is the national character of the CBI that makes it stand head and
shoulders above the myriad crime investigation department. Its prime
position as the investigator of all important and sensitive crimes has
brought it to the centre-stage in the public life of India.
Otherwise, the CBI, as an investigating agency, is on par with any other

crime investigation department regarding the law, judicial proceedings,
investigation methods and the powers and privileges given to the
investigators.
Does the CBI, in its present form, fully qualify to be a premier

investigating authority? The answer is no. The restraint on the CBI from
exercising its powers and jurisdiction in any area in a State without
the consent of the government of that State is a great handicap.
India, in 50 years, has come across several States giving and

withdrawing consent depending on their political and parochial
conveniences. This attitude renders the CBI part of a political game
plan tarnishing its image and degrading the merit of the investigations.
The CBI should be empowered to extend its tentacles to all areas of the
country and investigate all types of offences classified crime. The Act
has to be amended to that effect.
The Act provides for the appointment of the head of the CBI by the
Central Government, which involves politicians. Now, why should the head
of the premier investigating agency be named according to the whims and
fancies of the politicians in power? The power of appointing the head of
the CBI should be taken away from the Centre. The agency will then have
its credibility restored. Again, the Act has to be amended.
Once a case is referred to the CBI, the people assume that the law will
take its course. Only insiders know the turns and twists it undergoes
depending upon who is what in the case and in the Government
Right from taking up a case for investigation to the stage of filing a

chargesheet and later, anything may happen at any stage depending upon
the political dictates. A case may be investigated and chargesheet filed
within a few weeks or months or just shelved for decades. Arrests,
decisions on bails, searches, seizures and chargesheets are all subject
to political convenience. The political head gains this leverage by
becoming instrumental in the appointment of a particular police officer
who would never have dreamt of making it to the top.
The grateful chief knows to whom he owes his coveted position, and his
power and conscience are at the convenience of his political boss. This
is an arrangement of mutual benefit.
When the new chief dares to challenge the will of his political patron,
the sword of abrupt removal from the post is held over his head. Now he
has no option but to go against his conscience and professional will
unless he is prepared to sacrifice his job. By quitting, he does service
to nobody: after all, there are others waiting to distort professional
decisions at the command of the politicians. So he would rather join the
race. This is how the agency chief is brought down on his knees.
The malaise lies in the legal framework inherited from the Act the
provided for constituting the special police force. When a series of
sensitive cases against prominent political leaders was referred to the
CIB in the Nineties, the agency stood exposed by its meddling.
The case of the Bofors gun deal drags on; the handling of the St.Kitts
forgery case, the Jain hawala case, the urea scam, the JNN bribery case,
the Lakhubhai pathak cheating case, the Indian Bank scam, the
telecommunications scandal, the anti-Sikh riots case of 1984 and the
case of harbouring terrorists and mafia associates has dealt a blow to
the credibility of the CBI. The public no more trusts the CBI.
What exactly has brought about the situation? Delay, sometimes running
into years, in taking up or completing investigation of politically
inconvenient cases, prompt execution when the political climate is
congenial, decision to oppose or allow bails on political
considerations, building up cases around flimsy evidence such as entries
in diaries and inconsequential photographs sans corroboration have all
eroded the status of the CBI.
Going to the press about chargesheeting key political personalities even

before statutory permission is obtained for the purpose (the Supreme
Court observed, in this context: “ talking too much outside and also
carrying documents” in the pockets) and leaks about politically
sensitive cases make the agency suspect.
The charge that the CBI is more interested in trying the cases in the
media than in courts cannot be answered squarely.
If the appointment of the CBI chief is one side of the coin, the
enormous powers he and his political masters enjoy is the other.
Professional investigation by an upright officer can always be scuttled
and the officer abruptly removed if he is found too inconvenient.
Reverting officials to the base is always a possibility.
Mr.K.N.Singh, former Joint Director of the CBI, in his book, “My CBI
Days” refers to the harassment he underwent for pursuing investigation
according to his conscience. Mr.K.Madhavan, another Joint Director,
preferred voluntary retirement.
The solution lies in liberating the CBI from the grip of the politicians
and bringing its top brass to their senses about professional
responsibilities. Making the CBI autonomous is not going to achieve
anything.
There is no guarantee that the CBI chiefs who make merry in the company
of their political benefactors will behave better when left free.
Chances are that they may run parallel political manoeuvres to build a
base for theselves.The Supreme Court pronounced on May 5, 1997, that it
was not in favour of making the prime investigating agency totally
autonomous, but would like to evolve a method based on checks and
balances so that it could function independently in accordance with the
law.
The crux of the matter is “ a method based on checks and balances”. The
key is the appointment of the chief of the agency.
A statutory panel constituted of men from the judicial profession as

advisor to the agency may fulfil the need for “checks and balances”. The
panel may be invested with the power to appoint and remove CBI chiefs on
the basis of their performances.
The panel may advise the agency on taking up cases, arrests, searches,
seizures bail and chargesheets. The advice has to be statutorily binding
on the process of the investigation. The panel has to be free to monitor
the process and the pace of the investigation.
The panel may consist of a dozen senior most retired judges of the
Supreme Court as permanent members, one of them as chairman and the CBI
chief as member-secretary. The membership of the panel must be awarded
to the senior retied judges including chief justices.
Only a full panel with a minimum of 80 percent quorum must be empowered

to decide, on a simple majority, about the appointment and removal of
the CBI chiefs, promotions and transfers of officers of an above the
rank of Assistant Director.
The function, privileges, rights, liabilities and responsibilities of

the panel have to be clearly defined in order to avoid clashes with the
CBI.
A suitable amendment to the ”Delhi Special Police Establishment Act

1946” is the first step. The constitution of the panel as part of the
body of the CBI shall be the second step. And the third and most crucial
step will be suitable administrative measures to ensure that the panel
discharges its responsibilities in a fair manner. Appreciation and an
atmosphere free of bureaucratic hassles and pulls and pressures will
help the elder members of the judiciary discharge their responsibilities
in guiding the CBI in the right course.
Easy money and easy wealth have a tendency to inflate. Criminals tend to
spend lavishly. This ends up in a spurt in prices of land, building and
essential commodities while honest men have to toil hard for an extra
quarter. Crime begets money and money begets more money and more money
gets power, comfort and everything. In the crush, honest man is lost
forever. The ocean of criminal wealth around him which is beyond even
his wildest dreams frustrates him and ravages his sense of morality and
righteousness. It turns him violently against all human values and
decency, leading him to a world of crime and violence. It is what we saw
in Punjab, Kashmir, Assam, in far away Srilanka or even in Naxalism
where it is hidden in the guise of political ideology. It is an irony
that politicians and the police, who create the demons, eat their own
pies by falling to the bullets of the grievously hurt, self-righteous,
once innocent people. It is said that even the dacoits in Chambal are
symptomatic of this social and economic malady.
It is true that crime cannot be eliminated from any society as the

tendency to commit crime is ingenerate in human nature. However, crime
can be suppressed by appropriate straints. What straints and how they
are to be applied are ironically decided by politicians and the police.
If they come out of their indulgent interests to commit themselves to
their professional objectives, they can certainly save India from the
present predicament. Not that every politician and every policeman can
come out to achieve this noble task, but there certainly are noble
elements yet surviving as exceptions among them, who should take up
cudgels in favour of the Indian polity and sacrifice their lives and
careers, if necessary, to make the renaissance of Indian police and
Indian public life possible. The question yet to be posed is whether the
inveterate vested interests will let these sacrifices bear fruit. Let us
hope for the best.
CORRUPTION : INDIAN POLICE SCENARIO

Mr.Justice B.P.Jeevan Reddy, the law Commission Chairman while talking
on the provision of forfeiture of property illegally acquired by public
servants under the proposed bill titled the " Corrupt Public Servants
(Forfeiture of Property) Act, 1999" said, "Corruption has been severely
affecting the country's economy, security and administration. To weed
out this dreaded disease from public life, we need a bitter medicine".
All previous measures to rein- in corruption in public life failed
because nothing mattered as far as the ill-gotten property is safe a
huis clos. Situation may change tout ensemble after the proposed
legislation becomes law and gallows the corrupt of wiping out the very
corpus of the corrupt deeds and striking at the very roots of
corruption.
Corruption unfortunately has become an accepted phenomenon in extant

Indian society. No more it attracts societal disapproval or contempt.
Wealth is seen as wealth whether it is begotten by fair or illegitimate
means. Nowadays, jobs having means of easy money are sought and bought
at all costs. It is why such jobs command high premium in the job
market. It is no secret why jobs in select departments in government
service are in high demand. And within these departments there are
specific posts that command high premium on account of their
potentiality to generate enormous wealth by unfair and illegitimate
means. Such jobs command money in multiple suitcases in advance to the
posting in addition to periodical profferings for keeping the job terms
because those payments are proved sagacious investments. Politicians,
journalists to the victims of the system while condemning the vicious
practice from the public platform accept it as the sine qua non reality
of the life. The sterling question is whether corruption in any form
with the concomitant atrophy in administration and public life should be
tolerated to disgorge the vitals of the Indian democratic fabric.
It is tragic that the police which is morally and professionally bound

to protect the public from the vice of corruption is among the avant
coureur in the pernicious race. Sadly, the addiction is uniform at all
ranks from Police Constables to Police Commissioners save rare
exceptions. The corrupt practices take disparate forms in diverse
circumstances, but all leading to the same unfortunate end: derailing
the rule of law and the loss of credibility of the police.
A south Indian state saw in 1998 several wars of attrition between a

Police Commissioner and his political boss about posting of their own
favourites to key positions, leading to messy and dangerous situations
like more than one police officer being posted to the same key post of
profit and all of them holding to it fast for months together. Often
fightings broke out among the contenders in the same post for the loaves
of power and other behoofs and such matters made headlines in
newspapers. It is wrong to heap all blames tout a fait on any one side
as corrupt. Certainly no side is a paradigm of virtues in the extent
rat-race for pelf and booty. Corruption in India has become just a rider
of the availability of opportunities to share the res gestae of the
power.
Police is an institution in the service of law and order. Every case of

corruption involving the police represents a case of the rule of law and
justice harrowed. Imaging the extent of the distortion of the rule of
law and justice and the betrayal of the hoi polloi by the police
machinery that apportions in some cases a crore of rupees a year to
middle-ranking official as the illgotten money. The mise en scene is
complete with the swarms of police officials of all ranks au reste
warring inter se with wads of high denomination notes to corner posts
potential of generating unlimited illegitimate wealth. Added to this is
those apparatchik at the top making transfers and postings a thriving
business. What can be expected from a law and order machinery run with
such a symbion, but gross abuse and distortion of the rule of law? That
is why police is often called the legalised mafia.
Karnataka had a Superintendent of Police in northern district in 1980

who openly encouraged those down the line to take bribes and shared the
booty. He used to insist that they were free to allow illegal activities
like gambling dens, prostitution, illicit distillation etc. in their
respective areas, provided the criminals remain under their control and
run the activities pro rata to what they proffer to the police. A
maffled logic indeed. Naturally, he was very popular among the corrupt ,
subordinates. He left the district in 1981 and thereafter luckily went
on central deputation, never to return to the state sinsyne.
Corruption has disparate facets. And each has its distorted

justification. There is a case of a Police Commissioner whose misuse of
the police machinery in the marriage of his daughter in 1998 became a
stormy issue in the public eyes after press made it big. The press
claimed that the subordinate police officers were forced to man the
doors of the marriage hall and escort VIPs visiting the place. And
police wireless and departmental transport facilities were recklessly
made use of in the marriage and its preparations. Soon the issue was
hijacked by the subordinate police officers of the city who gave press
statements that police officials were allotted duties in the marriage a
la police duties in a security operation and expressed fears that those
who failed to budge would be victimised and likely to be removed from
their coveted posts in the city police. The Police Commissioner openly
defended his action in the interview to a private TV channel saying that
every father puts his heart to celebrate his daughter's marriage a
grands frais as his parting gift and he was not an exception.
CONSCIENTIOUS POLICING:
Conscientious policing is raised on the bedrock of committed and

non-corruptible policing. Serious and committed policing is conditio
sine qua non for professional policing and professional policing
presupposes duties and responsibilities taking precedence over personal
comforts and safety. Being conscientious brings depth and width to the
profession and raises policing to nobler heights. Corruption in whatever
form is the antithesis of this. It pulls down the police from its
elevated position as the national asset and insurance against the
atrophy of national values, security and well-eing of the hoi polloi.
A case of dowry death reported against a retired high court judge and
his family in February 1992 was referred to the state investigation
agency for investigation. The investigation made out a case for
chargesheet against the retired judge and five other persons including
his wife, son, two daughters and another person The chief of the
investigating agency in the rank of IGP being egregiously corrupt and
close to the retired judge, dragged his feet from further proceedings in
the case. The Superintendent of Police who was supervising the
investigation of the case wanted to take the investagation to its
logical end. But, arrests in the case were prevented and chargesheet was
unduly delayed from above. The insistence of the Superintendent of
Police, to chargesheet the case as the logical step of the investigation
process cost him his post and he was transferred in July 1992 to the
State Home Guards as the head of its training wing. The case remained
frozen sans chargesheet for more than 1 ½ years sinsyne till the IGP was
transferred out of the organisation in 1993. The case was later
chargesheeted in March 1994 with the retired judge and his two daughters
dropped from the chargesheet on the basis of the evidences tampered at
later stages. The dropped names were later included in the chargesheet
on the orders of the judge trying the case. The IGP who tried to stall
the wheel of the legal process subsequently succeeded in gaining entry
to a sensitive police organisation like the CBI and held the job till
1997.
PROFESSIONAL OBJECTIVITY:
A police organisation open to public pressures can do no policing worth

the name. They very idea of being receptive to pressures and
interferences is sysptomatic of lack of will for objectivity and
justice. Criminal elements take advantage of such opportunities to drive
the police and the policing on the wrong rails. Pressures often render
the police to commit crimes under the veil of authority either by
protecting criminals or more dangerously, by replacing them with
innocent people as criminals. The possibility of being open to the
pressures of the rich and powerful deprives the police of its
credibility. A police force that works at the behest of the rich and
powerful safeguards the interests of the rich and powerful only. It
would thus be factious and a villain to the hoi polloi. Does democratic
India need such a police force to perpetuate the tyranny of the poor and
helpless by the rich and powerful? Democratic India tolerated such a
police in the last five decades. India and its people must now abraid to
the situation and spawn a police that behooves to the trust laid on it.
The aberration of professional objectivity is the Achille's heel of the

police of independent India. The problem was simple in British India
where ruler and ruled were distinctly bifurcated and ipso facto the
loyalty of the police was perspicaciously defined unlike that of the
Indian republic of the democratic genre where people rule themselves
through elected representatives. Here the loyalty of police to the
public and public law is the professional ethic: misplaced loyalty to an
individual, a family, a party or an ideology at the cost of the general
public is an apostasy from the inviolable professionalism of the police.
The police in a democracy is the guardian of public interests and public
safety unlike in the raj where the police protected the interests of the
raj. This distinction is forgotten in independent India where mental
fetters are yet to be broken and legacies of the British rule continue
inveterated. How can a police that stays loyal to personal, familial or
party interests ever discharge its functions objectively to law and
general public? What can its locus standi be when a different person or
party comes to power? A sequacious police is an asset to any individual
or party and no sensible individual or party distances it in the name of
the professional ethics. It is the paravant duty of the police not to
breach the edifice of the police organisation and its spirit by
misprising its professional standards. This infrangible obligation is
thrown to the winds in the maelstrom of career advancements by the
self-seeking gendarmerie of the Indian republic.
In the perverted situation of India where the loyalty of the police to

those in power rather than to professional ideals is a reality, none can
vouch that police responsibilities would be carried out strictly on
merit of each case. Factional loyalties have the singular potentiality
of blasting fairness and impartiality. It renders professional loyalty
meaningless. A mature and sober political leadership can make up for the
Achilles' heel of the fractured loyalties of the police organisation.
Indian police needs a sober organisation above to bring it on rails of
carrying out its responsibilities. The neoteric judical activism, as far
as periodical review of the progress of investigation of some cases of
national importance is concerned, is a welcome step, though in normal
circumstances, such a judicial review would have amounted to gratuitous
interference with the independent functioning of the investigating
authority.
CHANGING VALUES:
Corruption of Indian police quite possibly is consectaneous of the

degringolade of values in Indian life of the post-independent era.
Indian police cannot stay sequestered from developments around while
there are marked falls in standards of diligence and integrity in other
walks of life. It adopted and adapted to the corrupt surroundings and
the result is extant corrupt police, India finds itself with.
The basic lures of corruption in Indian context are money and power. As
government service even at higher rungs lost charm in terms of monetary
comforts and prestige and power, it attracted only the second bests or
the lesser from the crème de la crème of the country's youth, who in
turn were left in lurches in the service to mend themselves. This
started a mad rush to the res gestae of pelf and power at the cost of
professional dignity and integrity. The situation led to corruption and
brought shifts in the concepts of diligence and professional loyalty and
rearranged the service objectives with priority to filling the coffers
of money and power. Organisational objectives were completely lost sight
of. Shifts in diligence helped to build money-power while shifts in
loyalties moulded proximity to power-brokers in efforts to maximise
individual behoofs after throwing professional ideals to dogs. The
degeneration spread in leaps and buonds with the passage of time as the
organisational commitments became demode and pragmatism taught that
immediate personal interests are the center of leading a good life. This
was the beginning of corruption of Indian police in a big way.
A major factor responsible for the corruption of Indian police is the

gross fall of its professional pride since independence. Crass and
insensitive handling of the police and police matters by political
leaders frustrated the high morale and sense of belonging of the police
force. Attempts to suppress and gain complete hold over the police in
democratic India affected the force adversely and injected a sense of
inadequacy in the force. Once the centripetal force that bound the force
together was squandered, centrifugal forces took over and dissipating
attitudes behaviors and influences ruled the roost to bring the Indian
police to the present triste state.
Motivation to achieve organisational goals and show results being

weakened is the inevitable manifestation of the fall of professional
pride. The police which once prided in enforcing law, maintaining order
and ensuring peace and security of the hoi polloi, lost all its
enthusiasm for these ends as they became factors of politicking and lost
importance independent of political relevance as crimes, criminals and
law and order and their handling by the police became accrescently tools
of political convenience. The development shattered the professional
pride of the police and struck a blow to their motivation towards the
organisational ends. No organisation can exist sans a driving force to
sustain it. The result is a vacuum of a drive to carry the police
onward. The vacuum is filled by corruption. Indian police find in
corruption a way to sustain itself in absence of any organisational
objectives to drive it onward.
Myopic and maffled approaches of the police often lead to untold

miseries and blatant violation of basic rights of simple individuals. A
daughter of an influential man in 1986 eloped with a man against the
wishes of her parents and was hiding in the neighbouring state of
Karnataka. The couple were in their twenties and decently employed. The
chief of intelligence of Karnataka was sought assistance to trace the
couple and ensure that the daughter rejoins her parents. The
intelligence machinery started to work in festinated zeal and the couple
were traced in Bangalore and were separated. The man was held in illegal
confinement and exposed to umpteen threats while arrangements were made
to call the influential man to rejoin his daughter. The man in
confinement was set free only after the influential man reached back his
home with his daughter. The action of the police in this case
perspicaciously is against the law of the land and violated the basic
rights of a young couple.
STRUCTUAL CHANGES:
The first and foremost job to do to bring back the police on rails is to
extricate the police from the unhealthy influence of all hues by making
it responsible to an independent Authority with absolute powers to take
decisions on matters of policing and police organisation. The Authority
should be a professional body of men and women of proven probity and
competence, who reached a stage from where they need not sacrifice their
convictions to appease those in power as members. A working arrangement
is to be devised by which the Authority becomes responsible directly to
the legislature and functions independently a la the judiciary, the
Central Vigilance Commission, the Comptroller and Auditor General or the
Chief Election Commissioner.
Creation of a Core Group of people adept in assessing men and character

within the aforesaid Police Authority helps to create a feeling of
confidence and job security in police and prod to discharge duties
fearlessly. This Group that oversees the work of police personnel from a
distance should be ultimately responsible for all career decisions in
the police force. The responsibility of senior officers in assessing the
work of the subordinates that forms the major embarrassment of the
present Indian police dispensation must be limited to giving opinion
about the performance of their subordinates to the Core Group; the
expert Core Group must process the opinion by its own research,
expertise and discretion and take responsible decision on its own
research, expertise and discretion and take responsible decision on its
own. The Group must be made responsible for all development plans of the
police, work assessment, job analyses, recruitment and management of
human resources etc. Institution of such a Core Group to oversee the
career development of police personnel without personal bias may bring
revolutionary changes in police by committing it to its work-ethics and
professional ends with single mindedness.
Police is not an odd -job boy of the government. It is not the hand-maid
of politicians in or out of power. Police is an organisaion of
professionals committed to the safety, security and well-being of the
country. Justice and rule of law are the litmus tests available to
achieve the ends. Once police miss the bus of justice and the rule of
law, their goals of safety, security and well-being of the public remain
a distant dream. They lose the credibility and respect of the public, so
essential for effective and proficient policing. The fear that the
police inspire can not take it far in the absence of credibility,
respect and sympathy of the public. Once the police lose their
usefulness in political and power gameplans consequent to losing public
credibility, their political patrons will discard them like used
condoms. The best bet for the police is to be professional and committed
to their responsibilities towards the administration of justice. Police
would forget this need only at their own peril. Doing anything violative
of its raison d'etre like sabotaging the course of justice and the rule
of law in the cauldron of corruption will prove fatal to the relevance
of the police to the society.
NEED OF COMPETENT BRASS IN POLICE

Police is one of the most vital instruments of the public administration
and works as a link between the executive arm and judiciary. It is the
ears, eyes and limbs of the government. No government with a failing
police system can survive whatever be its other assets, It is against
this background that the glitches bedevilling the present Indian police
should be viewed. Any complacency at this stage about the existing
police system may prove too costly for the unity and well-being of the
country and the health of its governance.
A job culture involutes basic beliefs and objects of the organisation,

professional ethics and the degree of commitment to the aspirations of
the organisation, as laid down by precedence and practice. To what
results precedence and practice mould the job culture decide the success
or otherwise of the organisation. The decisions and conduct of those at
the helm as the point d’ appui of police circles substruct the
life-lines of the organisation. It is important that only right people
reach the top. A headless organisation is better than one headed by a
degenerate weakling. This is why the policy of selection and promotion
at high levels plays a vital role in the growth of the organisation. In
a democratic age of self-seeking, short term political leadership, where
sycophancy is the sole criterion for ascending the career ladder, the
policy of selection and promotion is misdight at best and motivatedly in
the reverse gear at the worst, to the detriment of the growth and
functioning of the organisation. All those committed to the cause of
police and effective policing must break the trend and endeavour to
provide a fresh lease of life for effective policing.
How deeply the police is self-centred even within its own organisation
and what care and concern the police leaders show to evolve a perficient
and planned police organisation can be assessed by the trend of
evolution of the police organisation as an increscently top heavy setup
and the speed with which promotions are effected at different levels. In
states where there were only two officers of the rank of Inspector
General of Police, for say forty thousand men and officers about 20
years back, there are now nearly 30 officers of and above the rank of
Inspector General of Police, for say 80,000 men and officers; thereby
the last 20 years account for 100% expansion in the lower levels against
1500% expansion at higher levels. What these people at the top do for
policing apart from being a drain on the state revenue and a strain to
officers down the levels with conflicting instructions of dubious merit?
Almost nothing. It is unfortunate that none in the police administration
realises that it is not the rank but the real human stuff inside that
decides the height, excellence, merit, intelligence, honesty, integrity
responsibility, work knowledge and human qualities of a person.
Promotion to higher rank serves no purpose unless the higher rank
provides a really higher challenges and job content and a suitable man
is perforce selected to meet the increased challenges. This is not the
case in present police promotions where sinecures are created to
facilitate promotions to satisfy in-group instincts, Most of these jobs
are without any job content and responsibility and often are places to
relax from the pressures of family life. However, the same courtesy does
not extend to the more unfortunate ranks at lower levels including the
constabulary. While vacancies at the topmost level are filled up by
promotions strictly overnight, promotions at intermediary levels are
effected in weeks or fortnights or months, depending on the rank in the
police hierarchy. It is years in the case of the constabulary. There are
cases where vacancies of Head Constables and Assistant Sub-Inspectors or
Sub-Inspectors are not filled up for several years, depriving the
constabulary of their de jure promotions. There are any number of
instances of men in the constabulary retiring without promotion non
obstante their eligibility and seniority for the existing vacancies,
which are not filled up from many years. Policing is a job performed
mostly at lower levels with decreasing involvement upto the level of
Superintendent of Police. Beyond that, it is tout court a supervisory
task and in a police force with no supervision to speak of, higher ranks
are just de trop. Any move to expand these ranks and any undue haste to
promote to these levels cannot be called honest decisions in the
functional or public interest. Unfortunately, the Indian police is doing
just that and there is none to put it back on the right track.
DYNAMICS OF CORRUPTION:
A fall-out of corruption in the police is build- up a dynamics which

promotes the interests of corrupt in the system at the cost of those who
retained the pristine value of professionalism. The flexible elements
who can be menoeuvred to required moulds through the juste milieu of
pelf and position are useful assets to people in key position to save
their kith and kins’ interests as and when they get involved in criminal
proceedings. Such characters in police are always cultivated and posted
to key positions so that striking compromises when situation warrants
becomes easy. This strategy ends up in honest police officers being
sidelined and it promotes corruption. The dynamics while helps
influential individuals to evade the long arm of law, harms the
interests of the country, its police and the rule of law. Police
officers of plastic conscience are preferred to upright professionals to
key posts even in national level police agencies like the Central Bureau
of Investigation and the Intelligence Bureau. Police officers known for
professional approach are spurned and distanced as inconvenient
elements. In the situation, competence plays no role in preferences
while honesty, integrity and professional commitment play negative
roles. A history of bending backward on nonprofessional considerations
always becomes a qualification in obtaining preference to more sensitive
jobs in important police organisations.
The first and foremost job to be done is to free the police from the
unhealthy influence of all hues by making it responsible to an
independent authority with absolute power to take decisions on matters
pertaining to policing and police organisation. The authority should be
a professional body with men of proven probity and quality as members,
who have reached a stage from where they need not sacrifice their
convictions to appease those in power. A working arrangement is to be
devised by which the authority is responsible directly to the
legislature and functions as an independent authority like the
judiciary, Comptroller and Auditor General or Election Commissioner.
Creation of a high core group of people who are adept in assessing men
and character within the aforesaid police authority may help to create a
feeling of confidence and job security and prod them into discharging
their official duties fearlessly. This group which oversees the work of
police personnel from a distance should be made ultimately responsible
for all career decisions. The responsibilities of officers in assessing
the work of their subordinates which forms the major embarrassment of
the present Indian police must be limited to giving their opinion about
performance to the core group; the expert core group processes the
opinion by its own research, expertise and discretion and takes
responsible decisions on its own. The group must be made responsible for
development planning of the police, work assessment, job analysis,
recruitment and management of human resources, Institution of such a
core group to oversee the career development of police personnel without
personal bias may bring revolutionary changes by committing the police
to its work-ethics and professional ends with due single mindedness.
The extant system of selecting the police chief is erratic at best and
motivatedly amoral in that it meets political ends of the rulers at
worst. A conspicuous example is from a southern state of India where a
police officer who was sidelined in his career as an inefficient person
and degenerate habitual drunkard was given a fresh leash of lefe in
career a I’improviste and posted as the chief of the state police in
July 1980, after being promoted as the first Director General of Police
of the state to meet the political and personal ends of the new Chief
Minister of the state in new dispensation that came to power in the
state in elections. Soon, the state found itself engulfed in law and
order problems, rise in incident of crimes, indiscipline and discontent
in the state police force and dangerous union activities by the police
personnel. The new police Chief who was arranged to retire as IGP of the
State Vigilance Commission before being awarded the coveted post of the
state police chief was known to attend office in inebriated condition
and while away time in offence, doing nothing, However, political needs
overshadow all such facts in selection to the posts of Police Chief.
This is a dangerous trend. Attempts of the Supreme Court of India in its
recent order to formulate a system for the selection of the chiefs of
important police forces of the country like the CBI is a welcome measure
at least in its intent and must spur steps to formulate procedures of
the selection of all key police posts to insulate the process from
amoral and very dangerous extraneous considerations. This is a must in
the interests of the country.
CHALLENGES OF COORDINATION IN INDIAN POLICE
Multitude brings confusion. Multitude breeds rifts. Multitude is the

source of contraplex drives, necessitating efforts to forge divergent
thrusts into a single mosaic. This is true of police also. India has a
multitude of police organisations. Crime and law and order being a state
subject, each state and union territory has its independent police
force. A host of central police agencies like CBI, IB, SIBs, RAW, CRPF,
BSF, CISF, ITBP, SPG, BPRD, NPA, NICFS operate under the direct control
of the central government. The fabric of Indian police is woven with
nearly two scores of police organisations, held together by same laws,
procedure and the goal of national interests.
Various state and UT police organisations reflect the diversity of India

while central police agencies, the unitary nature. State and UT police
organisations extending from Kerala to Jammu and Kashmir, from Gujarath
to Arunachala Pradesh enjoy divergent ethos, environment and
professional attitude in spite and uniform police structure and goals.
They are manned at lower and middle levels of the hierarchy by the
people of the concerned regions though officers drawn from the length
and breadth of the country head them at the top. These organisations
jealously retain their identity and character and seldom venture out to
interact with others though much is made on paper and public platforms
about the needs of border meetings, combined operations and sharing of
professional expertise and intelligence. Though a deep feeling of
fraternity is a reality in police all over the world, it seldom
manifests in cooperation and coordination in working for professional
goals. Police organisations see each other with suspicion. Competition
rather than cooperation forms the plane of their mutual relationship.
The ingrained thirst for recognition and desire to monopolise accolades
and policing is the basic thrust of avoiding anything to do with
outsiders. Differences of job culture and environment make cooperation
and coordination further difficile. Differences of identity and
character add to the problem. As a result, police organisations build
barriers around them and work in isolation on common issues of crime,
security and law and order, leading to duplication of work and wasted
efforts en face criminals and hors la loi with their tentacles spread
all over the country, taking best advantage of the splintered mosaic.
The spiel of central police agencies is quite different. They represent

unity in diversity with an amalgamation of men, identities, environment
and character, drawn from diverse sources and tested in a single
crucible. Their stretch is broad covering the length and breadth of the
country with opportunities for interaction inter se and outside. These
agencies do depend on state and UT police forces for manpower. They do
operate all over the country. Yet, these agencies have their own
identity, character and job environment, which do not encourage give and
take with state police forces and inter se in any meaningful sense.
Again, it is one-upmanship and immanent passion to corner all
recognition. Precedence of narrow interests over performance and results
in central police agencies is not a wholesome affair.
Synergy for better policing is briller par son absence in the mosaic of
Indian police. An institutional mechanism for cooperation and
coordination between various police organisations is the need of the
hour in India. Old habits die hard. There are instances of such an
institutional mechanism being proved ineffective. An apex intelligence
coordination committee to bring all intelligence agencies under a single
umbrella has not met with much success in independent India. Save
routine inconsequential papers and reports, intelligence agencies and
elite security and protection groups of the country work in isolation
from each other with no coordination to speak of. It is so also with
police training and research agencies, working in their own ivory towers
abstracted from field requirements, as there is neither the
institutional mechanism nor the will to come together, interact and
cooperate.
Reasons are many for these barriers. Police forces work under different
governments and ministries headed by politicians of their own political
and ideological agenda. State and UT police forces follow the agenda of
their respective governments. Among the central police agencies, CBI
reports to the ministry of personnel, intelligence agencies to cabinet
secretariat and most of the other agencies to the home ministry. Egos of
the heads of these governments and ministries come to play in the style
of functioning of the police forces. Added to this is the bloated egos
of the heads and chiefs down below the line of these organisations.
Together, they prove a deadly combination against creating a mosaic of
police environment in the country. Each piece works on its own in
artificial isolation from the other. This is the tragedy of Indian
police.
Good fences make good neighbours. But, this is not true of organisations
forming the splinters of gestalt dedicated to common goal like policing.
Cooperation, coordination and synergy for concerned efforts are the
needs here. Symbiosis, not fences makes sense here. Organisational goal
is the raison d’etre and has to be reached by all means and resources.
Every failed opportunity lost to do better signifies a failure. Every
failed opportunity to interact with a potential source is an opportunity
lost to do better. Every wasted mutual relationship signifies a failed
opportunity to interact. Every missed beneficial contact is a wasted
mutual relationship. Such beneficial contacts being infinite among
police organisations, moving towards the same goal of security and rule
of law, the dimension of the lost opportunities to do better can only be
imagined. This is what is happening in Indian police: police forces
failing to pool together their immense potentialities by each going its
separate way. And each looking shilpit and weak sans mutual support in
the process.
Lack of coordination is not just an inter-organisational challenge. It

is an intra-organisational problem too. In the mosaic of state police
force under a single police chief, myraid subordnate units pull apart
from different sides and defy the compulsions of cooperation and
coordination inter se, required in the interests of the organisational
goal. District police units and functional units like the crime branch
special branch, armed forces, training units, police research and
administration units, each function independently and in complete
isolation from the other in violation of the call for synergy from
above. The tendency of going alone is inveterate in Indian institutional
psyche. Ultimately, it is individual performances that is recognised and
appreciated. Institutional performances have few takers in Indian
environment. Cooperation and coordination though spawns better
performance, the prospects of shared recognition and appreciation are
deeply resented. Recognition and appreciation get precedence over
organisational objectives in the present environment of Indian police.
The remedy lies in restoring organisational objectives to their rightful
place in the ambience of police. The immanent prevarication of the
police from the professional path and the ingrained slant to
self-agrandisement make it easier said than done.
Border meetings are rare. More than that, often they are meaningless
exercises conducted for the purpose of record. Joint operations by
neighbouring police units are rare to the extent of being unheard of.
Resentment to take advantage of the specialised units like crime branch,
special branch, training units etc is also evident. The only exception
is the services of the armed police in states and the paramilitary
forces at the centre. The reason is that the utility of these forces in
controlling unruly mobs overshadows the problems of ego-clashes and
recognition.
Mutual indifference is just one side of the problem and simpler in that.
The other, more complicated face of the problem is inter-organisational
rivalry and attempts to sabotage the works of each other. This manifests
in two forms: One, as a self-surviving, instrument and the other, as a
result of jealously and one-upmanship. Police in a region collude with
law-breakers of the region wherein the law-breakers restrain from
creating problems in the region in exchange for trouble-free life from
the local police. The criminals are allowed free to operate anywhere
outside the jurisdiction of the local police. The arrangements can other
passive or active. In a passive collaboration, police, do not actively
assit the law-breakers in their nefarious activities outside. Just that
the police knowingly shut eyes to the existence of the criminals in
exchange for the latter refraining from stirring water at their ponds.
Criminals in exchange for the latter refraining from stirring water at
their ponds. Criminals use the places for retreat and rest. They serve
as hiding places for the criminals. Criminals need such places of
retreat and rest to fall back after their activities outside. Bangalore
serves as such a retreat for most terrorist groups including Naxalites,
LTTE,ULFA,Kashmir separatist and radical Akali cadres. The terrorists
avoid striking anywhere in Karnataka and unnecessarily stirring the
police there. In return, Karnataka in general and Bangalore in
particular is used by them as a retreat for hiding, rest, medical care
and strategic meetings. Sivarasan, Subha and their associates hid in and
around Bangalore after assassinating Rajiv Gandhi. Naxalites are often
noticed taking medical treatment at various private clinics in
Bangalore. So also other terrorist groups. Local police avoid acting
against them unless compulsions dictate otherwise, so that dogs in
slumber are allowed to continue to sleep.
In an active collaboration, both the police and the criminals or one of

the parties actively assist the other. The police may assure and
actually provide protection from potential troubles. They may leak
intelligence about outside police organisations operating against. The
hors la loi on their part may use their criminal skills to the
advantages of the police in sabotaging the interests of the rival police
organisations apart from sharing the res gestae of their operations with
the police. The police may use the criminals to raise crime rate at
particular areas in the neighbourhood or create law and order problems
there for strategic benefits.
Even in case of cooperation and coordination as a state policy,

coordination may become a casualty in the absence of purposefulness and
commitment. The combined operations of Karnataka and Tamilnad police
often with the help of BSF in the forests of M.M. Hills region along the
Karnataka-Tamilnad border against forest brigand Veerappan is a point.
Nine years of combined operations yielded no results. Lack of
coordination among Karnataka and Tamilnad police is often stated as a
source of the glitch. Approach of the police of the two states to catch
the brigand is presumed to be at variance. Tamilnad is considered to be
relatively soft to the brigand while Karnataka, that lost many of its
officers and men to the guns of the brigand, is after his blood. Au
reste, absence of bureaucratic and operational coordination between the
police of the two neighbouring states and survives in his exploits sans
souci. As a strategy, he strikes inside the borders of a state and
escapes to the forests of the former state after striking inside the
borders of the other state. A perfect coordination between the police of
the two states should have made the operation easier and more feracious.
But, it is not to be the case. The game is going on and the police of
both the states are frustrated on end. The case of Veerappan clearly
shows that border areas where coordination between different police
units are called for for effective policing, are havens of criminal
operations. Absence of coordination in police makes it so.
Sabotage of mutual interest is not a problem confined to Indian police

only. It is a universal problem and manifested in the police of even
enlightened countries like the United States. There are instances
available of the CIA and the DIA, the intelligence brethren of the
United States government, trying to steal sensitive assests and useful
agents from each other’s furrow and undermining them when failed to win
over. Such instances in the police of other countries, however, do not
make them en regle in Indian police.
Lack of professionalism and single minded commitment to organisational

goals is the root cause of the problem. Absence of an institutional
machinery for affecting coordination and efforts to define the scope of
such a coordination adds to the problem. The so called border meeting
and occasional seminars and conventions are informal and far-between
measures on individual inspirations of a few, at best. In the ambience
of absence of the spirit of cooperation and coordination, such isolated
inspirations seldom make abiding impact, Mutual suspicion builds
barriers. The problem can be overcome by two methods; One devising an
institutional machinery for such cooperation and coordination between
different police organisations with a rider of making their use binding
in all relevant case. A compulsion brought about by law for cooperation
and coordination will go a long way in improving the situation. Second,
encouraging and cultivating the spirit of cooperation and coordination
in the police culture. Coordination at higher levels in key operations
and exposure of the lower levels to their success stories will bring
necessary changes in the psyche of the Indian police. Careful overhaul
of the selection process to absorb right people and a training programme
devised to strengthen the characteristics of coopertion and coordination
will go a long way in building an environment of cooperation and
coordination in Indian police. Work curlture in police force must
encourage it. Leadership qualities that realise cooperative and
coordinated efforts into reality and pave the the path for it, have to
be made the bedrock of policing and police character.
Indian police now is more a collection of splinter groups than a mosaic.

There is no rhyme or reason in their mutual relationships. Different
police forces do not match with each other. There is discord and
cacophony; no concinnous music. Each Police organisation in the tapestry
of Indian police works for its own end at its own wavelength, spawning a
picture of disorderly melange. How such a motley crowd can perform the
job of national interest together? The disharmony cost India a Prime
Minister and an ex-Prime Minister in the hands of assassins and terribly
suffered the country in the hands of the extremists of Punjab, Kashmir
and North-East. Dacoities are rampant. Threat to peaceful and orderly
life is prolate. Security is shaky. Crimes and steadily accrescent.
Commitment to professional policing is fractured. Public fund invested
on the police goes down the drains. The resurrection of Indian police
must be built on the foundation of cooperation and coordination between
diverse police forces to make concerted policing possible. A semblance
of unity in diversity in the mosaic of Indian police is the need of the
hour. A sense of belonging and oneness among all police forces is sine
qua non for effective policing. Unless this foundation is laid, the
edifice of Indian police is bound to crumble and collapse one day. No
attempts to resurrect Indian Police will ever succeed unless this basic
need is fulfilled. A fractured police setup as in India now is a
dangerous drain on the public exchequer with unimaginably huge money,
time, energy and work wasted by seepage through weak joints. Once this
problem of cooperation and coordination is fully attended to, the money,
time, energy and work saved are enough to take the police to the heights
unimagined before and infuse new life and vitality to it. Unfortunately,
no serious thought was given to this matter of utmost importance in the
last five decades of independence. It is high time now that Indian
leaders realise the bevue and make up for the lost time by giving their
full attention to this nonfeasance. Only that can save India and Indian
police from the present maelstrom.
INVESTIGATION OF DOWRY DEATH CASES

Nature created woman different from man to her disadvantage to
bear male atrocities unless and until society in an enlightened mood
comes to her rescue. Atrocities against women are covered under
various sections of Indian Penal Code and a few special laws. Of
these, dowry death cases have become sensational topical issues with
public being highly sensitised to the menance. Investigation of dowry
death cases has special links with the science of forensic medicine
because of the special nature of the investigation taking place within
the
family circle without eye witnesses or even nonpartisan witnesses.
Inexact definitions and certain anomalies of Acts and Rules concerning
Dowry death investigation render investigation difficile. The loopholes
Need to be corrected. Marriage as the second birth in a girl’s life
brings
Adaptation problems with it. An integrated approach to these problems
Alone can bring deliverance to the fairer sex of the human genre.
Nature created women different from men with a definite purpose. Balance
is stillness and stagnation; imbalance is motion and progress. Nature
designed life and action by means of the imbalance brought about in the
traits of men and women. In the process, women find themselves at the
receiving end. They ended up as the weaker half of society by their very
nature and are naturally handicapped in a world of men, by men, for men.
In a world where strength commands charity and weakness receives
cruelty, a woman is at a great disadvantage. She has suffered all types
of cruelty and humiliation all along centuries with patience and in
silence. This part of woman is symbolised in tradition by calling her as
the Mother Earth who bears all sufferings. The cardinal principle of the
survival of the fittest applies to the weak, natural attributes of woman
which renders her less fit for survival than man. She must live at his
mercy and on his charity, silently bearing all his atrocities unless and
until society in an enlightened mood comes to her rescue.
The immane approach of the stronger world to its weaker counterparts has
to be countered with strong arm methods of the state power. In an
enlightened age such as this people in public life are sufficiently
sensitized to this issue and more and more legislation come up to stop
stronger people from riding over the weak and meek. India too has
several legislations that have become Acts to protect its women folk.
Atrocities against women in India are mainly rape and unnatural

offences, dowry deaths, abduction and kidnapping for various purposes
and outraging their modesty apart from minor acts like various marriage
offences, dowry and other harassments, insulting the modesty, causing
miscarriage without consent and prostitution. Most of these offences are
punishable under the Indian Penal Code : in sections from 375 to 377,
for rape and unnatural, offences, abduction and kidnapping girls for
various purposes being punishable in sections from 364 to 369, offences
related to marriage being subjected to penal provisions in sections from
493 to 498, outraging the modesty of a woman in section 354 and
insulting the modesty in section 509 being offences. Section 314 makes
causing miscarriage without women’s consent, a punishable act. The
Criminal Law (Amendment) Act 1983 (No.43/83) provided for in camera
trial of rape cases and also enlarged the scope of rape cases by placing
the burden of proving innocence on the accused persons apart from making
penal sections more mordant, particularly in cases of custodial rapes by
public servants. The Suppression of Immoral Traffic in Women and girls
Act 1956 with the Suppression on Immoral Traffic in Women and Girls
(Amendment) Act, 1986 and rules framed by states u/s 23 of the Act deal
with offences relating to immoral traffic in women and girls.
Dowry death cases have become sensational topical issues these days with
the public being highly sensitised to the menace of the offences with
the unfortunate swelchie of cruel practices and circumstances deliver an
innocent girl at death’s door. All institutions of society including the
government, press, women’s organisations, judiciary and police handle
dowry death cases on a special footing. Each such case outrages the
patience of thinking people and rouses passion and outcry against the
perpetrators of the offence. The police too give special importance to
the investigation of these cases and closely supervises the
investigation process. In the circumstances, an insight into the
investigation of dowry death cases and proper understanding of the
spectrum of challenges posed and how they are met is in the interests of
both the public and investigating officers. It must be borne in mind
that no investigation can succeed without public cooperation. And the
public, particularly people aggrieved by such unfortunate incidents, can
contribute to the progress of investigation of they have knowledge of
its due process. With this in view, salient features and parameters of
dowry death investigation are outlined in this work.
Investigation of dowry death cases has special links with the science of
forensic medicine because of the special nature of the investigation.
Dowry deaths are figuratively called bedroom deaths. In most cases, no
outsider including the investigating officer can have any knowledge
about the circumstances and events that led to the death. Secondly, the
offencers being the custodians of the dead body and the scene for many
hours after the death till they volunteer to make its occurrence known,
have all the time in the world to eliminate or tamper with any clues. In
the circumstances, the investigating officer is completely at the mercy
of medical experts to interpret the cause of death.
Often, the mode of death noticed, be it asphyxia, drowning, or burning,

may prove to be post-mortal ;ipso facto suggesting homicide in place of
suicide. Only forensic medicine can provide decisive proof to the
investigating officer.
The success of the investigating officer in investigating dowry death

cases largely depends upon forensic medicine experts. Sans proper
briefing from the latter, the investigating officer may not realise the
importance of noting the profusion of bleeding or marks of inflammation
in deciding whether wound is antemortal or not. Again, in a poisoning
case, the investigating officer may overlook the importance of recording
the time when the deceased ate last, how many hours thereafter the first
symptoms of poisoning were noticed, what were those symptoms and how
many hours thereafter death occurred. Thus, the interaction between the
investigating officer and forensic medicine experts is crucial to give
the investigation a direction.
Dowry death investigation has to address certain problems in the field

in collecting evidence and examining witnesses.
These offences take place within the family circle. Sometimes, though
blood relatives of the deceased volunteer evidence in the heat of
trauma, a gradual reconciliation would be the normal tendency.
Therefore, sound evidence is rarely forthcoming and difficult to
sustain. Dowry death being an offshoot of the relationship of wife and
husband and veiled in a shroud of secrecy, even the parents of the
deceased may be unaware of the hardships the deceased underwent at the
hands of her husband and his relatives in the process of the dowry
death.
If the investigating officer is lucky, he may succeed in collecting

some, evidence of cruelty. The next stage at which he would find himself
would be the girl’s death. There would be an absolute void in-between
with no clues or evidence of what happened or no eyewitnesses to vouch
for that , Clues on the dead body and surroundings are likely to be
tampered with by the offenders.
Investigations are witness-oriented. A dowry death case being primarily

a family affair, independent witnesses refuse to involve themselves. And
partisan witnesses are too polarised to be credible.
It is in these circumstances that investigating officers have to trace

witnesses, conduct purposive examinations and undertake directional
recording of statements after proper analysis of the offence and likely
charges.
The dowry death cases are offences primarily under central Acts namely
the Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961 with its amendments of 1984 and 1986 and
certain sections of the Criminal Procedure code, 1973 as amended by
Criminal Law ( 2nd Amendment) Act, 1983. In spite of attempts during
amendments to avoid ambiguities in some sections of the earlier Acts, it
is patent that there are still several louche terms that need
interpretation by the court. The term ‘ in connection with the marriage’
while defining dowry in section 2 of the Dowry Prohibition Act is
unspecific about the flexibility of the word ‘ connection’ and gives way
for its subjective interpretations as well as that of the term dowry. ‘
The same word ‘ connection’ brings in a similar impression while
defining ‘ dowry death’ in Section 304B of the Indian Penal Code and
Section 113B of the Indian Evidence Act while declaring ‘ in connection
with demand of dowry’ ipso facto rendering the incatenation between the
offence of dowry death and dowry’ demand uncertain and open for
discussion. In the same sections, the phrase ‘ soon before her death’
raises the question, how soon before? Similarly, the words ‘ relative of
her husband’ that figure in Section 498A of the Criminal Procedure Code,
Section 304B of the Indian Penal Code and Section 113A of the Indian
Evidence Act in no way provide exactly what is intended to be defined;
the scope of the words there is too vast and includes even the blood
relatives of the deceased as they are also relatives of the husband
after the marriage. Another important term that defies full
comprehension is ‘ likely to drive’ in Section 498A of the Indian Penal
Code, where the word ‘like’ by its very meaning is indefinitive and open
for subjective interpretation. The scope for divergent interpretations
of these terms in the comparatively new acts do create problems during
investigation of the cases until convention assigns them definite
meanings.
Law by sections 113 (A) and 113(B) of the Indian Evidence Act relieves
the investigation of cases of death of girls within seven years of their
marriage from the special nature of difficulties by the reason of the
crime being committed in the intimate circle of the offenders. The law
provides that the court trying the case may presume that the accused
persons committed the offence if it is proved that the victim was
subjected to cruelty by the accused persons inter alia. The presumptions
made easy the investigation of these otherwise impossible cases.
While the presumptions under section 113(B) of the Indian Evidence Act
is applicable to prove dowry death cases u/s 304 (B) IPC, section 113
(A) is applicable to prove abetment to commit suicide u/s 306 IPC within
seven years of the marriage. The latter presumption benefits
investigation of cases while a girl commits suicide under harassment for
reason other than dowry also by her husband or in-laws within seven
years of the marriage while the benefit is available for cases of
suicide under the same circumstances and homicide for dowry reasons
under the same circumstances. This renders investigation of cases of
homicide of girls by husband and in-laws within seven years of marriage
which poses the same difficulties as suicide cases under the same
circumstances an impossible task and there are any number of such
homicide cases that were acquitted which would have been convicted by
the benefit of the presumptions u/s 113(A) of the Indian Evidence Act if
they were suicide cases. Amendment of concerned laws may be necessary to
avoid this loophole in law.
If the investigating officer adequately employs his common sense and

intelligence during the preliminary stage of the investigation while
examining the dead body and the scene and collects all incriminating
clues and evidences without restricting himself to the apparent cause of
the death, no criminal can fool him and deflect him from the right line
of investigation.
Marriage is often called the second birth in a girl’s life; it brings an

entire metamorphosis in the form and contents of her life and in the
process exposes her to inopinate adaptation problems. It is an irony of
nature and social customs that it is the girl who is delicate in nature
rather than the man who is selected for this difficile gauntlet of
transformation in the process of familial socialising. Per case, the
gentle and amenable character of the female breed expose her to the
natural selection for the purpose. In the process, death of the most
unfortunate of them by felo de se or homicide because of the grind of
the circumstances has become an unfortunate phenomenon. Dowry is only
one though primus interpares among various immane manifestations of
adjustment problems to which the tender psyche of a young girl is
exposed after her marriage. An integrated approach to all these symptoms
of adjustment problems to which a girl is suddenly exposed while her
persona is yet unprepared to meet the gauntlets alone can bring
deliverance to the fairer sex of the human genre. The entire process of
social legislations and their enforcement is only a distant link in the
whole catena of luctation warranted to achieve this end.
INVESTIGATION OF ECONOMIC CRIMES

With liberalisation, the aboideau of scams and financial irregularities
is thrown open and Indian financial market is flooded with all
conceivable kinds of frauds, shady transactions and corrupt practices.
As long shadows of mixed economy receded from the four decade old sky of
the Indian Republic, the Indian economy is sweltering under the heat of
economic crimes. Not that economic crimes are new to human generation or
India; small fraudulent dealings were born with man and bound to
continue as part of his nature till the imbalance of supply and
consumption haunts his existence. What manifested is organised frauds to
loot the public its money by clever use of the financial environment and
the innocence of the hoi polloi; ill-conceived financial rules and laws
and slack financial practices and procedures evidently failed to carry
the weight of the liberalised economy. The people who were inured to
protected economy and state control cannot easily adapt to liberalised
economy where all sorts of worms and creatures creep, waiting to make
best use of the laissez-faire. Rules and laws being not tightened to
meet the challenges of the liberal atmosphere, unscrupulous elements
have a field day in playing with the public money either to
intentionally defraud or experiment in risky projects. The plans are
always mega-schemes running for hundreds or thousands of crores of
rupees of the gullible public. Corruption in government and public life
ease the process. Bribes play key roles in keeping rules, laws and
regulatory authorities shut. The sounding of finance minister,
Mr.P.Chaidambaram in June, 1977 after CRB scam came to light that law
enforcers must ruthlessly deal with economic offenders is too small
coming too late to have any meaning or impact on the atrophy already
set-in, in Indian economic labyrinth. The problem lies in the
liberalisation process having taken-off without adequate infrastructure
of checks and counterbalances to sustain it. Educating the public about
the nuances of a liberal economy and preparing them for the risks
immanent in the system as well as strengthening the reticulation of
rules, laws and law enforcing system to handle and control economic
crimes go a long way in keeping away the extant maelstrom and making
liberalisation a more relevant and meaningful direction to Indian
economy to pursue.
On closer scrutiny, it is obvious that Indian democracy and

administration are over-weighed with myraid rules, regulations, laws and
controls. The problem of India is their enforcement. What India needs is
efficient enforcement, and not more and more rules and laws. This is
true of Indian economy also. The need is desperately felt in the
atmosphere of liberalisation. Enforcement has two faces: preventive and
investigative. As far as preventive measures are concerned, the present
rules and laws are adequate to bring any financial operation to a
standstill. Slack, inefficient and casual enforcement process laced with
corruption makes economic activities possible in India. In the
atmosphere of liberalisation where economy is less regulated and
controlled with fewer rules and laws to tie the hands and legs of the
market forces, illegal activities find avenues to surface to the
detriment of the open market. Stringent enforcement of relevant rules
and laws to prevent illegal activities is the need of the hour. When
preventive machinery fails in its activities is the need of the hour.
When preventive machinery fails in its task, the investigation agency
comes to the force. When preventive measures collapse, the demands on
the investigating machinery increases to bring the hors la loi to book.
Demands per se do not meet the needs of efficient investigation.
Commitment to the job is one side of the need. The other side is the
skill of investigating economic offences.
Investigation of economic offences is a specialised job requiring

special skills far removed from the needs of investigating bodily
crimes. An investigator of economic offences has to be well versed in
the intricacies of financial transactions, the dynamics of the market
forces, rules and laws regulating and controlling the financial market
and the finer aspects of auditing and accounting apart from a sound
analytical disposition to interpret the data and evidences during the
process of investigation. He should command indefatigable patience to
scrutinise and interpret stacks of bills, vouchers, minutes, contracts,
balance sheets, audit reports, correspondences, records, registers and
other documents. It is a time consuming drudgery far removed from the
glamour attached to it.
A point central to both economic crimes and their investigation is the

willing cooperation and participation of several related agencies and
individuals in the operation. They call for group-work involving meeting
of mind and synergy towards the main goal. Symbiosis is the sacred hymn
of the operations. Indeed, there is a main player to whose initiative
and plan, all others contribute as and when required. Other constituents
in the play necessarily include key government agencies responsible for
regulating financial activities in the country and its key officials.
Large scale economic crimes need their cooperation in shutting eyes to
willful violation of inconvenient norms and regulations of financial
discipline and active connivance in issuing official favours against
rules to ease the passage of defrauding the public. Such constituents
may include commercial banks, the SEBI, The RBI, the Ministry of
Finance, any of the three credit rating agencies of the country, the
auditors who audit the company or all of them in synergy as in the CRB
scam. Other ministries and agencies involved in activities related to
financial matters may also form part of such fraudulent operations. As
CRB scam made explicit, non-banking finance companies form the spine of
such frauds on the gullible public.
Investigation of an economic crime must cover the role of these

agencies, the key officials involved and the mens rea, the quid pro quo
involved etc and support each fact with sound evidences. The work
necessarily requires willing cooperation of the agencies concerned to
provide related documents as evidence, interpret the meaning and
significance of these documents, explain the related practices,
procedures, rules and laws and provide inside information pertaining to
the commission of the fraud au reste volunteering to be witnesses to the
crime. The investigators require guidance from these experts about
evidences and the course of further investigation to build up the case.
This is a formidable job that cannot be handled by one investigator and
a handful of his assistants. An essential feature for the successful
investigation of an economic crime of large dimension is constitution of
a team of experts drawn from all related agencies to assist the
investigator.
Investigation of any economic crime cannot be fair and square unless the
investigation covers all aspects of the crime. Localised investigation
leads to unfair and partial justice. The aspect is popularly forgotten
in the investigation of scams and scandals in Indian environment.
Localised investigation limited to the main front-man of the fraud is a
simple job that can be completed in a short duration to everybody’s
satisfaction including the clever criminals and the guillible public
with only a paid front-man sacrificed in requital to the gain of
hundreds or thousands of crores of rupees. Such unfair investigation
suffers justice and financial discipline and encourage financial
institutions to connive in such frauds. The crux of the investigation of
economic crimes in tracing the end-users of the fraud and reaching the
persons responsible for planning and organising them. Rarely these
investigations in Indian environment reach the depth, nor touch the
government agencies and its key officers who willingly contributed to
the fraud for gain by commissions and omissions. It is a grave Achilles’
heel of the investigation of economic crimes in India.
In an intelligently planned, organised and executed megafraud, the big

fish always remains inconnu. It is only the little or sometimes
middle-sized fishes who act as the front for the main-players are
caught. It is so arranged in such frauds that all books and records
point only to the front-players; public contacts and media exposures are
designed to play up the roles of the front-players. The real players
remain at the background harmless even while the fraud comes to open. It
is only a few daring players who venture into risky financial operation
with honest intensions, do so in their own names and get caught while
their venture with the public money dooms. An investigator should be
familiar with these nuances of the crime. Another aspect is the
possibility of the grists made from the fraud being tucked away or
invested in some far away foreign countries. Swiss banks are only a tip
of the ice-berg. An investigation into economic crimes is incomplete
without a probe to this possibility. A corollary of this aspect is
violation of Foreign Exchange Regulations; thus FERA comes to picture,
Offences under Income-tax provisions is another side of the crime. A
mega-economic crime spreads it tentacles over myraid financial
enactments to involve independent investigations to the same crime by
different agencies au reste the investigation by the police. This leads
to gratuitous waste of time, manpower and energy by duplication of works
apart from creating problems of inter-agency coordination and
inter-agency rivarly. The fear of impinging on the limits of other
agencies prevents free and concerted investigation. The result is
shallow and peicemeal investigations by several agencies leading
nowhere. Solution to this problem lies in integrated single
investigation with the cooperation and active participation of the
concerned financial institutions as expert advisors in the investigation
team. Only such a holistic investigation can delve deep into the roots
of the crime and unearth the truth in its entirety as a means of
deterring recurrence of mega-frauds. No investigation into economic
offences is complete without the impresario of the fraud, however deep
be his cover, is brought to book and his gains, wherever it be stacked,
is unearthed. This is seld done in extant Indian investigation
situation.
Investigation of mega-economic crimes cannot be handled by all and

sundry investigators. Apart from investigation skill, they required
special attributes to lead that investigation to a successful end. For
one, they must have basic knowledge and familiarity of the goings on in
the financial world to help them understand the interpretations and the
explanations of the experts in the team about the complexities and
intricacies of the financial transactions of the crime. In the absence
of this basic familiarity, the investigators may appear like fishes out
of water in the maze of financial transactions leading to the crime.
These datas being often encoded and computerised for safety by clever
criminals, a splatter of knowledge of computer and software are helpful
to manage control over the process of the investigation. An essential
feature for a investigator of economic crimes is leadership qualities,
an ability to delegate and decentralise work, ability to trust right
people, inspire confidence, draw cooperation and ability to coordinate
the works of myraid agencies involved in the investigation to guide to
the desired end. Commitment to lead the investigation to successful end
and ability to work hard are other characteristics sine qua non for the
investigator.
A serious handicap of the investigation of economic offences is its slow

process. The reason is mental fatigue. Examination of loads of
documents, records and papers per se is a tiresome and time-consuming
labor. To crown it, the mental processes involved in sifting right and
relevant documents from the heap of papers, interpreting them, placing
in right perspective to the commission of the crime, assessing its value
in the overall process of the commission of the crime etc., are
extremely exhausting and tiresome job. It naturally retards the pace of
the investigation and the process taking years for completion is a
common spectacle. On the other side, time is central to the
investigation of economic crimes. Money rapidly multiplies with time in
form of profits of investments or interests on deposits. Delay of
investigation is in the interests of the criminals with this illgotten
money. Delay in investigation process helps criminals to multiply their
res gestae several times with the passage of time, ipso facto rendering
them huge gainers in terms of monetary benefits that easily off-set the
pains of trial and conviction in court, if any. Early completion of
investigation is vital for the cause of justice. Constitution of a team
of investigators including experts from various financial institutions
should be able to overcome the natural handicap of inordinate delays in
the investigation of economic offences.
A need of common sense in investigation of economic crimes is the

initiative of the investigator to make up the losses of the victims of
the fraud to possible extent by luring the criminals to a deal. Here
comes to picture the discreetness of the investigator in striking a deal
with the criminals selon les regles without jeopardising the process of
the investigation in any way. Investigation per se does not bring any
relief to the victims of the fraud as its value lies only as an
instrument of deterrence. Safeguarding the interests of the hapless
victims is the cardinal need in the circumstances au reste bringing
criminals to the book.
Huge money running to hundreds and thousands of crores of rupees is at

the centre of the investigation of scams and criminals are those who are
clever, influential and stacked with easy money. In the circumstances,
attempts to lure the invesigator from the rightful path of investigation
are a natural phenomenon. For the investigation to be successful, the
investigator should have immense inner strength to resist the lures and
stick to his professional path. It is said that every person has a price
; and meeting whatever price is no problem in the efforts to distract
investigators of mega-economic crimes from their commitment. In the
circumstances, selection of right people as investigators becomes a key
decision in the success or otherwise of the investigation.
The tendency of soft-pedalling the role of financial institutions in the
commission of economic crimes for whatever reason is a serious Achilles
heel in the investigation of such crimes for the simple reason that
lapses by these agencies create a framework for the crimes. No large
scale frauds against the general public is possible without these
agencies responsible for the financial discipline of the country
willingly ignore violations of financial norms and regulations and offer
favours against rules and laws of the financial discipline to the
criminals engaged in the frauds. The role of theses institutions in the
commission of the crimes is as grave as that of the main –players and
the impresarios of the fraud. The fact is forgotten in the investigation
of economic crimes in India. The result is lopsided and unfair
investigation which satisfies none let alone acting as a deterrent
against recurrence of such frauds. CRB scam is an example. Unless many
agencies responsible for financial discipline helped the the commission
of the fraud by the CRB capital markets by blatantly ignoring violations
of norms and regulations by the latter and unlawful favours, the
swindling of the public to that extent would not have been an easy feat.
The SEBI tolerated CRB managing scores of shady share issues and
permitted to start a mutual fund and a share custodial service. The SBI
opened its banking services to the company to encash interest warrants
and refund orders of the company from the public without adequate
security. Credit Rating Agency and IDBI’s subsidiary CARE gifted the
company’s fixed deposit programme, CRB caps a “A+” rating in spite of
the full knowledge of the liquidity problems and deteriorating assest
quality of the company after ICRA and CRISIL failed to oblige the
company. The auditors of the company ignored irregularities in the
company’s operations in the audit report. To top it all, the RBI turned
blind eye to massive irregularities noticed during inspection and issued
an in–principle banking licence as favour and even tolerated the company
raising money for its bank after the licence was withdrawn. In absence
of the synergy by various financial institutions of the country. CRB
Capital Markets just could not befool and defraud thousands of investors
to the extent it did, and struck gold. The key figures in these
financial institutions who helped CRB scam are as much responsible for
the scam as was Mr.C.R.Bhansail, the head of CRB capital Markets. Their
involvement gives an added dimension of conspiracy to the case. Law
which provides for the investigation of the case, treats all these
players of the conspiracy on equal footing. The exclusive attention of
the investigation agency on the CRB chief and his close associates to
the exclusion of other conspirators cannot be called en regle and bound
to shake the confidence of the public in the investigation.
This is not an isolated case of financial institutions prevaricating

from their raison d’ etre. Another top credit rating agency of the
country CRISIL failed to warn investors in advance about the poor
showing of ITC Classic Finance on the eve of the issue of NCD and fixed
deposit schemes of the company. For CRISIL, this was the second instance
within the short duration of a year after similar failure regarding
Mideast Shoes. The role of commercial banks infamous security scam is
too well known to be repeated here. Indian Bank scam is waiting on the
side-wings to blow up to a major scam. Ignoring the part of financial
institutions and other government agencies in mega-economic crimes is a
sure way of ringing the death-knell of the financial discipline of the
country. An investigation true to its profession must give primus to fix
these institutions for their irresponsible roles and connivance in the
scam. The responsibility of the main-player of a scam reduces to
insignificance before the filures, lapses and impacts of the connivance
of the players of these institutions on the financial market and public
life of the country. No honest investigation can afford to leave the key
figures of these institutions out of the field of investigation.
Distractions like strikes and protests by the colleagues of the
offenders in the institutions as in the case of suspension of the
officials of the Bombay Branch of the State Bank of India for complicity
in CRB scam should not deter a professional investigator from his
commitment. Corrupt colleagues flocking together to go on agitation to
protect one of them while caught is becoming a popular strategy of
scaring away the hands of law reaching them. A few years back, central
customs and excise staff of Delhi international airport resorted to
agitation to protect a few corrupt colleagues from the CBI net,
Recently, air traffic control staff went on agitation while some
inefficient of them were suspended from service for grave dereliction of
duty. Very recently, arrest of public servants in Bihar fodder scam was
deferred by the CBI for the fear of creating law and order problems. A
turly professional investigator should not be deterred by such
extraneous developments in his resolve to unearth the truth. This is ore
so in case of the investigation of economic crimes for the simple reason
that the money involved in such crimes in capable of buying anything
under the sun and creating any situation to the advantage of the
criminals.
Crimes are committed either out of passion or for gain, if not by

accident or negligence. Economic crimes constitute a major and important
block of the crimes for gain. Economic crimes against the gullible
public and the financial system of the country assume dangerous
dimensions because of the magnitude of the crimes, their impact on the
financial discipline of the country, the losses and grief come with it
to the gullible public and the sense of the loss of credibility it
brings to the financial market. Professional and in depth investigation
to these scams is sine qua non for the growth and stability of the
economy of the country.
INDIAN POLICE AT A CROSSROADS: WHICH

WAY TO TAKE?
Policing, being a specialised job, remains an enigma to outsiders,
including administrators and the general public. Its status, somewhere
between the armed forces and the civil administration, renders its
structure, scope and style of functioning undefined in the monolith of
governance. This coupled with the prolate powers to cover all aspects of
living, has made the police an awful force to live with.
The situation is like one-way traffic wherein the police have a say on
every aspect of the life of the people while the latter hardly know
anything about the department. This has given the police the unique
advantage of dictating what should be what, where and how in policing
and the police organisation. This could be a boon if the right man sits
at the top. But, sycophants climb the ladder and reach the top to hold
the reins and guide the destiny of the police. The result is the Indian
police has got what it deserves-a spiritless culture created by
incompetent leaders.
It has been nearly five decades since independence. The standard

expected and observed in the police at the dawn of independence is no
more. Belatedly though, it has been realised that self-rule does not
mean fraud and tyranny and that the cabals of compatriots are no less
pernicious than that of the aliens. Forty eight years is a long enough
period to realise the need to break away from the webs of corruption in
independent India. India and the Indian police thus stand at a
crossroads.
Policemen are social doctors and policing is a surgical operation to

systematically remove cancerous growths from the body of society. What
if the band of doctors itself is infested with serious malignant
growths? This is the position of the present day Indian police. The
police, as the enforcers of law and protectors of public interests,
wield tremendous powers. Such powers must be invested only in people of
high probity and conscience. Otherwise, the powers will ruin the social
fabric of the country and usher in anarchy. Powers to search, seize,
remove, detain, direct, arrest, hit and even kill may prove pernicious,
if trusted to wrong hands.
How these powers are exercised depends on the work ethics of the
organisation. It is those in an organisation who build up its job-
culture and vice versa. Even a degenerate character turns honest and
efficient in an honest and efficient environment. The work-culture
builds and moulds the vitality to meet the general atmosphere around.
Also, an honest and efficient person in a degenerate culture is bound to
change sooner or later, unless his individual strength conquers the
vitiating work-culture of the organisation. Building up a proper
job-culture is, therefore, the bedrock of a proficient police
organisation.
The problem of the Indian police lies in a lack of understanding of the

scope and ground rules of its work. This results in the absence of a
proper set of standards to approach the call of duty. Consequently, each
call of duty is approached subjectively, depending upon the mood and
understanding of the police in charge of the situation. This,
unfortunately, is accepted by all strata of people. The Indian police
never recognises the equality of all and the need to provide security to
all citizens of India. Whether it is in matters of protection,
maintenance of order, crime control or investigation, the standards of
policing applied to a nameless poor farmer in a remote village and say,
a former Prime Minister, both of whom have equal rights before the law
and the Constitution, do vary.
The point is not that the principle of equality should defy ground
realities, but policing must have a reasonable set of standards within
which the more important and the less important aspects must operate. It
will not be so in India until people who place their personal interests
beyond everything, including law, justice, fairness, objectivity,
righteousness, career pride and professional interests, hold the reins
at the highest levels of the department.
There are two types of approach to policing:

a. The playful approach wherein the police, as players in a football
game, play the game within the scope of the ground rules to have the ball inside
the goalpost without committing a foul. Here, the game is played
dispassionately and played because the members are paid to do so.
b. The passionate approach wherein the police break all rules and laws
that come in the way to make their task a success. They may even commit crimes in
the process.
The Indian police oscillate between these two disparate approaches,
depending on for whom they work and what would be their personal gain
ultimately. Only a few people with money and power to back policing of
the passionate genre deserve the passionate approach. Others must remain
contented with the ‘ playful approach’. A dignified police organisation
should shun both attitudes. The former is against the tenets of
professionalism and commitment to work. The latter, in spite of its
commitment to its goals, is devoid of objectivity, fairness and justice.
For, policing by criminal methods cannot be called professional
policing.
The right approach to professional policing is a synthesis of both the

approaches in which the commitment to achieve goals respects the rules
and laws of which the police are guardians. Professional commitment
implies achieving goals within the parameters of the permitted methods.
The professional end of the police is upholding the interests of law and
justice. Policing is not an end in itself. It is a tool to serve law and
justice. Policing by committing crimes against law and justice is
committing crimes against policing. The Indian police is yet to show
maturity of professional commitment extending equal attention to all the
needy, irrespective of their stature, wealth and position in society.
The state of human relations in Indian police does not bring credit to
the organisation. The relations are brittle and mechanical without a
human touch. The relation between different ranks are soft or hard
depending upon the nature of their jobs and mutual advantage. It is
rather a donor and recipient relationship while soft, and master and
servant relationship while hard. There is no genuine human concern and
no sense fo recognition of the other man as another human being. The
other’s human qualities and talents are dismissed as inconsequential
trash. This is equally true among officers of the same rank and has led
to an atmosphere of mutual suspicion in spite of an outward show of
belonging to the single family that the police is.
The police chiefs must think hard to decide whether the current model of
human relations in the police is conducive to healthy policing or not. A
sound police organisation thrives on sound human relations between and
within ranks, sustained by genuine concern, mutual respect, recognition,
sympathy and understanding. Such relations do not perforce go against
police discipline and the official command-obedience functions. Instead
a sense of belonging and unity of purpose are cultivated. The
hierarchical order only defines the relations created in the minds of
the people. Good relations strengthen the hierarchical order by making
the order willingly acceptable to all and thus facilitating its working.
A subtle mental bond that links all men in an organisation is its
greatest asset. A sense of recognition from others coupled with the
pride of belonging creates a happy atmosphere in the organisation and
improves efficiency and output.
Sadly this is just the reverse in the Indian police. Here, human
relations are vitiated. Mutual suspicion and antagonism are the rule.
Men in higher ranks revel in hurting the pride of the subordinates while
the latter wait for the right time to settle scores. In this atmosphere
of hostility and under-cuttings, the organisation and its objects
suffer, all its people suffer and the country suffers. This is where
India stands at present.
The success of a police organisation depends on its ability to create a

sense of pride and dignity in its members including the constabulary, so
that they consider themselves as useful and responsible members of the
police outfit and endeavour to live up to the image. The goal can be
achieved by proper modulation of perks, rewards, praise, good treatment,
respect, censure or punishment has been earned by him. This is a far cry
from what is actually happening in India. Good work is seldom
recognised. Every job is done as a personal favour. Medals and citations
are divested of their distinction by being linked to seniority and not
merit That is why medals carry no meaning within the organisation.
What the Indian police inspires in the public is fear and hatred, not
trust, respect and love. This is the greatest single failing of the
Indian police. A police force feared and hated is irrelevant in a
democracy. The argument that fear is a necessary constituent in policing
is not based on the right understanding of human psychology. The police
does stand on a different footing from the general public but that
status is based on trust, respect, love and a healthy awe, not, fear and
hatred. It is healthy awe that inspires in citizens genuine cooperation
and willing subjection to police authority.
Police is not synonymous with fear. A smiling and helpful police force
is a salient feature of democracy. The police is not the enemy of the
people, especially in democracy. Policing involves enforcement of order
for the good of many which may sometimes mean inconvenience to a few.
The job, if performed right, must win the trust, love and respect of the
masses. The misuse of power and a supercilious approach will alienate
the common man and earn his hatred. The exercise of police powers with
absolute humility is quite possible. An approach of service to the
general public renders the exercise a sensible and delicate task and
avoids harshness. It is up to the police to show its good intentions and
convince the public about its trustworthiness. Nothing the Indian police
does now will help to create this image. It is time serious efforts were
made in this direction.
The situation can be salvaged by clearing the cobwebs. There is a bunch
of self-motivated officers in key positions in the police who have
contributed to the downslide of the Indian police in the post-democratic
era. They have corrupted the police atmosphere, set wrong precedents,
encouraged self-indulgence eroded its tough image and reduced it to its
present cadaverous existence. These elements should be sidelined to make
way for men of probity to refurbish and rebuild the setup.
The future of India depends upon the strengths and weaknesses of its
police. Defence forces are relevant to the existence of India in so much
as defending its borders and protecting its system of government. But
the relevance of the police is more meaningful, for, here, the very
existence of India as a nation is at stake. The significance of the
police is often forgotten somewhere between the width of civil
administration and the depth of the defence forces.
The police must be powerful. It must be a disciplined and committed

force. It saves the country from all disasters; it supports the
administration in civil rule and works as its watch dog. It works as a
subsidiary force in support of the military during war. If need be, it
can run the administration when civil rule breaks down and can function
as an armed force if the military fails. The importance of this great
tool of governance is yet to be recognised. It is time Indian police is
given a fresh lease of life of vitality and strength. Yes, something
should be done to save the police. The question is, who should begin the
process, and where, when and how? Who will bell the cat to bring it to
its senses?.
CRIME, POLITICS AND THE POLICE

The police, with their links with politicians on the one hand and
With criminals on the other, have become the protectors of vested
Interests with no more commitment and passion for law and justice.
People are more and more disillusioned with the extant political
Institutions. The percentage of the electorate that takes the trouble
of going to polling booths to cast votes is steadily decreasing from
election to election.
In a blinkered system like ours, where power and wealth are the ultimate
virtues and where power and wealth in themselves stimulate mutual
growth, to the exclusion of all other dimensions of life it is no wonder
that the people of this poor country succumb to the trappings of power
and wealth at the cost of all virtues, values, pride, dignity and human
decency.
In an increasingly competitive and complex world, where every day, more
mouths are added to share limited resources, where the principle of the
survival-of-the fittest operates to its logical end and where the basic
needs of survival and decency can be assured only with power and wealth,
people naturally go all out to ramp the ladder of power and wealth by
whatever means and cost.
JUSTICE, A CASUALTY
In the process, justice and morality become casualties. Criminality too

raises its ugly head as an instrument to achieve otherwise impossible
objectives. This is how politics and crime knit together in the fabric
of Indian public life.
The story of the police is somewhat different. As an important part of

the nation’s administration, the police enjoy tremendous power over vast
fields of human activities with responsibilities towards the life and
death of the hoi polloi as well as dignitaries. In this sense, the
police are the cutting edge of the State power and its ultimate bearer.
No power can be its own law without the police on its side as an
executioner and loyal watch dog. This is why politicians in their
activities feel the need for wooing the police to their side.
The police of independent India have become, by reason of their failing

strength of character and talent, easy prey to the power baits of smart
politicians.
Their greed, unsound social background, lack of commitment to good

values and failure to comprehend police virtues in the right
perspective, make them willing partners in whatever politicians do, or
intend to do. They refuse to look beyond their political masters and
their dispensations of job favours.
So law, justice, righteousness, professional ethics, morality decency,

human dignity, the common good of people, national interests and even
conscience-otherwise common to any human being-have become invalid
nonsense to them
The police, sans sound character and personal integrity, are no more
than country dogs. This is what the Indian police have become in free
India. The politicians, inebriated with new power, smartly brought these
weaklings to absolute submission and held them on a tight-leash to be
their personal watch dogs and personal gendarmes-in-requital for
favourable job placements, undue promotions and other largesse from time
to time.
Nothing is valued higher than this largesse and its dispensers by the
new police of India. It is how the police were involuted in the
conspiracy against decent public life of India.
It was a hop and skip for the police from the ugly world of politics to
the mysterious world of crime and the underworld. The police have become
a weapon of politicians to bring about the subjugation of the crime
world to use its resources for political ends.
FALL OF CHARACTER
Politicians, thus, made good use of the decreasing strength of character

of the police in forging a nexus between the police and criminals in the
furtherance of their own ends.
With a weak spine and no principles in the face of odds, the police are
only too pleased to follow in the footsteps of their political masters.
In these changed circumstances, discipline and subordination, which form

the basic connecting link of the police hierarchy, have lost all
meaning, and are interpreted as blind subservience to those who have
power to serve personal interests.
And politicians easily led the police to the despicable cul-de-sac of

the nexus with criminals-the very people who are supposed to be
controlled and brought to book for antisocial activities.
With politicians as the custodians of power en arriere to support, the

police plunged lock, stock and barrel into the lucrative crime world;
the resulting wealth and comforts were in no way less sweet than the
hard earned money of law-abiding society.
This is how one nexus between the police and crime world was
established.
Whom should we blame for this hapless position? Certainly not the
politicians or their auxiliaries like criminals and police who are the
unfortunate by-products of the grind. They are created by the situation
arising from a system which misfits the people for whom it was devised.
The blame lies either on the Indian people who are unresponsive to the
democratic system evolved for them. Because of their unenlightened and
venal conscience, which is so insensitive that virtues like honesty,
service, patriotism, quality and excellence can make no dent in it at
all; or it lies with the political system devised for them. It failed to
take their psychological make-up into account, and ispo facto led to the
problem of maladjustment in national life.
Otherwise, how can we explain criminals and goondas winning elections

with impunity, even while rioting and murders were committed at their
behest on the eve of elections itself? The fact is that the chance of
winning an election often is pro rata to the aura of a tough image built
around the candidate.
IMMATURE ELECTORATE
It is these people who win elections and rule this country. It is these
people whom the Indian electorate prefers to vest with powers to
safeguard their interests!
Obviously, the Indian electorate lacks the far sightedness and vision to
understand the consequences of its irresponsible decision.
It is yet too immature to take decisions about the interests of the

nation and see how national interests are closely linked to its personal
interests. It is yet to broaden its perspective to include the life of
the nation as an integral part of its own.
Long –term and rational decisions are alien to its nature. Immediate
selfish interests and parochial outlook continue to be the driving force
of all its actions and decisions- on the matters of national importance
or personal concern.
In most parts of India, it is money, arrack, sari, threat, fear of

landlords or the blazening propaganda of a candidate that influence its
decision as to whom to vote for.
How can the future of this country be safe in the hands of such an
electorate and its elected leaders?
How can an indifferent and irresponsible electorate provide honest and

efficient leadership to the nation?
This weakness of the electorate has ultimately left Indian politics in

the hearth of violence and manipulative extortions, with the instruments
meant to protect them mowing the field. Saner elements in politics, who
found survival difficult, have left the field, giving way to elements
which are more suited to the field.
It is how politics, from a class of dedicated and virtuous leaders, has

become a pit of junk. The credibility, which is the pith of any
political life, is the biggest casualty in Indian politics.
People are more and more disillusioned with the extant political
institutions. The percentage of the electorate that takes the trouble of
going to polling booths so cast votes is steadily decreasing from
election to election.
It is an open secret that an election is an opening for a candidate to

invest money to reap wealth, comfort and power for the next 5 years. And
how he reaps the wealth, comfort and power is again not a mystery at
all. It is corruption and misuse of public money.
If he is ambitious and intends to promote his career interests, there is

no way out in the existing system but to resort to pulling strings and
pursuing other more deadly methods. Often with the active collusion of
the officious criminals and police.
The unhealthy nexus often leads to and facilitates other forms of crime.
Cases of rioting, assault, kidnapping, rape and blackmail, involving the
supporters or relatives of politicians, criminals and police in
futherance of a political cabal are other usual forms of crime that
result from the vicious nexus.
Often, criminals and police are employed to create disturbance or

inspire sensational crimes in furtherance of political goals. The losses
of life and property involved in the wily schemes seldom touch the
conscience of either the politicians, the criminals or the police who
are responsible for these dastardly acts.
The political patronage and the nexus with police desensitise criminals
to the process of law and justice. They are emboldened to commit more
daring and ruthless crimes that endanger the life and property of the
plebeians.
The police, in their links with politicians on the one hand and with
criminals on the other, are in their new avatar-the protectors of vested
interests with no more commitment and passion for law and justice.
They have become a discredited force, a willing instrument of power

brokers in the ruthless and violent cabal of power-games with no heart
for the common man and common cause.
This is the requital the Indian electorate gets for letting by its
nonchalance and irresponsibility-the political system putrefy.
POLITICISATION OF CRIME.
What we see today is just the tip of the iceberg. There are more things
hidden in the latter than are seen.
This is soon realised by the opportunist Indian politicians who seize

the first available instance to enlist the support of criminals and
underground operators for their nefarious designs.
This, in turn, is a god–sent opportunity for criminals to restore their

lost credibility and social standing with the help of their association
with the custodians of power, apart from the security and protection
from the police that ensure from the association.
They promptly grab the opportunity to their advantage and show how
useful they can be to politicians in their career-promotion designs and
in the wreaking of personal vendettas.
The experience and professionalism of criminals come in handy to

politicians to execute their nasty operations without attracting the
stigma attached to them.
The vast army of criminals has become ready resource for them to use
whenever need arises. This has given a sense of confidence and security
to politicians, who are otherwise vulnerable in their highly uncertain,
challenging and competitive environment.
Often, politicians have so much relied on criminals that the latter have
become their most trusted lieutenants, even getting elected to
legislature with their help and blessings.
There have been instances in India, where prominent politicians have

refused to disown their notorious criminal friends in public even after
reaching the vortex of their political career. This shows the sway held
by criminals over politicians in the Indian situation.
It is a fact that no syndicate of organised crime in small and big

cities anywhere in the world can survive even for a day without
political patronage. Ergo, all syndicates of organised crime and their
menace are the direct outcome of the nexus between politicians and
criminals, with the police as bystanders.
No criminal can take lightly the need for political patronage in running
his crime syndicate. Be they smuggling syndicates, gambling houses,
narcotics dealers or plain hoodlums, the only way to survive is to have
comfortable political protection at the right levels.
MUTUAL ADVANTAGE
The crime syndicate, in return, pay a good percentage of their criminal

gain to the protectors. Thus, it is an arrangement to mutual advantage.
The crime world also provides hoodlums as volunteers to perform

challenging tasks during the election campaigns of their political
patrons, apart from liberally financing these campaigns.
How can a politician, after gaining power with the help of a criminal,
ever let down the criminal? This symbiosis of politicians and criminals
which has emerged from the extant Indian political system. Is the root
cause of all the complications discussed until now.
The very fact that politicians are prepared to risk their reputation
rather than distance themselves from the crime world, shows how highly
the world of crime is regarded by the politicians in their scheme of
things.
Politics and crime have become the 2 faces of the same coin in the
present state of affairs and a saying goes that there cannot be politics
without crime and no crime without politics.
In the present Indian situation, it is true that the lotus of politics

can blossom only in the offal of crime.
In an atmosphere where placements and transfers are decided by the needs

and wishes of self-seeking politicians, no police can efficiently
function nor can they be free from the interference of the politicians.
It is not surprising that hungry politicians grab more and more powers
that are legally and traditionally invested with the police department
when the top brass lack strength of character and conviction.
The leads to a position wherein the police department becomes a

chessboard on which politicians move their pieces to checkmate their
adversaries and win the political game.
In other words, the police sans effective leadership is becoming more a

handmaid of politicians by moving away from its sacred role as the
guardian of law and justice and the protector of the common man.
The credit of bringing the police from their height of power to the
present level of absolute submission should go to the superior strength
of personality of wily politicians who have bent the police on their own
terms with the selective use of stick and carrot.
The police is not the real police and what is does is not policing in
the proud sense of the term.
CHANGED ROLE
With the increasing involvement of the police with crass politicians,

the conception of the police about their own role has undergone a
large-scale change. No more do the police look at crime control and
maintenance of order as their first duty.
With this, the concern for crime control has received a setback and
crime control and investigation have receded to the last priority-except
when politicians are interested in them for a specific purpose.
Only crimes that disturb politicians foment police to galvanic and

meaningful action. Other crimes receive no priority.
The very definition of the gravity of crime is adapted to suit the new
conception. Those crimes which are tolerated by politicians are no more
crimes.
The self-image of the police as “a fearless arbiter of crime” is changed

to a solicitous servant in attendance at the pleasure of a
politician-master.
This blunting of the crime card of the police has made it less
awe-inspiring and less deserving of respect from the criminals.
The police have more and more realised that criminals, particularly
those from organised syndicates, are personal friends of their political
masters and they are no match for the criminals in terms of wealth,
influence and social standing. The men of the police see those criminals
on equal footing with their political masters and learn to treat them
with awe.
They find it absurd to act with authority against the high-profile

criminals who are too high for the small stature of the police.
It is unfortunate that the police of today have never realised their

infinite stature as law-enforcing agents vis-à-vis all others including
criminals and politicians whom they are empowered to search, arrest and
take to court if they deviate from rightful path.
Sadly, the trifling wealth and the concomitant “ big-man” image of

others appear to the present police as more appealing than their own
awful police authority.
On ultimate analysis, crime is a universal phenomenon. All living beings

are criminals in varying degrees. Criminal thought is a part of the
natural function of a healthy mind as is the moral restraint that
prevents the criminal thought from being acted upon.
External restraints brought about by the fear of law, custom and adverse
reaction, reinforce the inner restraint to prevent the committing of
crime.
However, as the force of external restraints weakens for diverse

reasons, and the proporation of gain to be made in committing a crime
outweighs the risks involved in the balance sheet of the operation, the
lure of crime increases and the deed is accomplished.
SOCIAL ACCEPTANCE
It is the social situation which controls the external restraints to

make committing a crime an asset or a liability. It thereby decides the
proliferation or suppression of crime, human nature being what it is
always.
Criminals are criminals because society gives them easy openings to thus
meet their needs. Politicians love to befriend criminals rather than
bring them to book because the society they live in makes their lives
more comfortable with criminals as friends rather than as adversaries.
Policemen find the crime world sweeter because it is how things stand
for them.
The remedy for the proliferation and endearment of crime lies in

changing the social dynamics to make crime a liability to criminals and
criminals a liability to politicians and the police. In the existing
nexus of politics, crime and police, crime is an asset to criminals and
criminals are an asset to politicians and police.
Criminals should not be construed as a separate block of citizenry. They

are a cross-selection of people from all fields of life who have moved
beyond a commonly accepted degree in their criminal tendencies.
Criminality may be prolific in certain civilised fields like commerce

and industry in the form of tax evasion, violation of foreign exchange
regulations, hoarding etc.
Such crimes are generally not taken seriously in spite of the public
awareness of the crimes and the social standing of the criminals remains
unaffected. Government servants too come under this category of
criminals because of rampant corruption in public life.
EMPOWERING THE CBI

The appointment of the CBI chief has to be a professional,
not political, decision. This power must be taken away from
the Central Government.
The last decade of the century sees the CBI becoming the Indian version
of the FBI under J.Edgar Hoover in the middle of the century-with one
difference. The FBI became a key component and feared public institution
through Hoover’s open aggression, while its Indian version gained
eminence by the open, meek submission of its spineless Director to his
political masters. This naturally alerted the otherwise somnolent
judiciary and the result is the proactive judiciary of today. The CBI,
with cases against political leaders stacked on its shelves, under the
nose of the proactive judiciary, had no option but to steadfastly
discharge its responsibilities. So the CBI started working, and shed its
vulnerability to the political class.
The CBI is the premier investigative agency of India. Naturally, it must

command the best brains in the country and should have wide-ranging
powers. It must have adequate leadership, marked by exemplary personal
attributes like probity and professionalism. But are these needs met by
the CBI at all?
The seventh schedule of the Constitution brings police and public order,
except for deployment and use of forces of the Union, under the State
List, and criminal law, criminal procedure, administration of justice
and judicial proceedings under the Concurrent List. However, it
specifically lists the CBI under the Union List. The legal basis of the
CBI is provided by a short six-section Act of 1946 titled the Delhi
Special police Establishment Act, 1946, which provides for the
constitution of a special police force by the Centre for the
investigation of notified offences in any Union Territory and in any
area in a state where jurisdiction of the police force is extended by
the order of the Centre, with the consent of the state government.
The last section of the Act specifies that the force has no jurisdiction
in any are in a state without the consent of its government. The force
enjoys all the powers, duties, privileges and liabilities of the police
officers of an area in connection with the investigation of offences
committed in that area.
A premier investigative authority invested with powers extended to all

areas is a sine qua non for maintaining the rule of law. Naturally,
police and public order provisions under the State List cannot meet the
needs of a central agency. Hence the enactment of the Delhi Special
Police Establishment Act 1946, as a prelude to the constitution of the
CBI and its inclusion in the Union List.
But sadly, the CBI does not measure up. The dependence on state
clearance is a great handicap. We have seen umpteen number of states
providing and withdrawing consent to the CBI depending on political and
parochial conveniences. This is a dangerous trend that renders CBI
functions and jurisdiction subject to political manoeuvring, and lowers
its images. The result is the growing criminalisation of politics. The
remedy lies in spreading the tentacles of the CBI, by law, to every area
of the country, with blanket powers to investigate all classes of
offences.
The Act provides for the appointment of the head of the CBI by the
Centre. Considering the importance of the CBI, it is natural to wonder
whether the choice ought to be dictated by the politicians in power. The
question is of immediate significance because of degraded political and
public morality, and fragile coalition governments. The appointment of
the CBI chief has to be a professional, not political decision. This
power must be taken away from the Central Government, to bring all on
par, deprive the party in power of an unfair advantage and give the CBI
some credibility.
There is no alternative to trust, even in the current atmosphere of

degraded values in building an institution. Fides punica leads nowhere.
So also in the appointment of the CBI chief. The solution lies with the
judiciary, whose members are assumed to be nonpartisan.
The CBI should be subjected to the supervision of a statutory panel

constituted of men of the law, acting as advisors to the agency. The
panel has to be invested with powers to appoint and remove CBI chiefs,
on the basis of performance, at its collective discretion. It should
advise the CBI on whether a case merits investigation and decide on
arrests, searches, seizures, bail and chargesheets. Its advice has to be
statutorily binding. The panel has to be free to monitor the process and
pace of investigation and must constitute a statutory part of the CBI at
the highest layer.
The panel may consist of a dozen senior retired judges of the Supreme
Court as permanent members, with one among them chosen as chairman on
the basis of seniority, and the CBI chief as member-secretary. The
membership of the panel must come to the senior most retired judges,
including retired chief justices, as a matter of right, unless an
eligible candidate opts out in writing or is incapacitated by age or
illness, ratified by a two-thirds majority in the panel. By the same
majority, the panel, may force out one of its extant members in the
interests of justice. The panel may monitor and take decisions on cases
as a full panel or constitute sub-panels with the CBI chief as
member-secretary for each. However, only a full panel with a minimum 80
per cent quorum can decide by simple majority on the appointment and
removal of CBI chiefs and decide on deputations, promotions and
transfers of officers of and above the rank of Assistant Director, and
assess their work.
The panel’s functions, privileges, rights, liabilities and

responsibilities have to be clearly defined to statute to avoid clashes
with the main body of the CBI. An amendment is the first step, followed
by the constitution of the panel. And the third and most crucial step
will be administrative measures to ensure that the panel discharges its
responsibilities with commitment. Due recognition and an atmosphere free
of bureaucratic pressures will help the members discharge their
responsibilities properly. Life membership, barring contingencies, will
help them to be true to their conscience.
The CBI is the spine of the criminal justice system, and a shattered
spine leads to umpteen complications. The derailment of the CBI is
reflected in public life, in political uncertainty. It is an irony that
the situation created by a weakling CBI led to circumstances wherein it
is in a position to dictate terms up political parties. The CBI is
metamorphosing into a Frankenstein’s monster. This is not in the
interests of the CBI, the country or its criminal justice system. The
sooner out leaders realise the gravity of the situation and infuse new
life in the CBI by amending the Act, the better.
TIME TO IMPROVE THE QUALITY OF CIVIL

SERVICE
India wanted its All India Services of the post-independent era to break
away from the British legacy and as a first step altered the names of
the services. It is an irony that the process led to and marked a
dilution of quality. The present Indian Administrative Services is not
even a poor shadow of the old Indian Civil Service; nor does the Indian
Foreign Service bears a resemblance to the Indian Political Service; and
the present Indian police service lacks the vigour of the good old
Indian Police.
The old All India Services was built on the tripod of faultless
selection and recruitment, perfect training and exposures to the highest
standards of professionalism and character to sustain it throughout.
But, new India just failed to give these factors the importance they
deserved.
Reasons for this deterioration are many. The first is inherent lack of
passion for quality and excellence. The agency incharge of selections,
the Union Public Service Commission, is manned by people unequal for the
task either in their professionalism, efficiency, passion for brilliance
or basic character, How can the process be reversed?
Merciless pruning of the extant services to create a compact and highly

responsible core of administrative potentialities to handle a few
sensitive key positions in the colossus of the administration is needed
now. Nothing short or brilliance and highest potentiality to handle the
affairs of the country should find a place in the wing that is
responsible for constituting the nerve-centre. The administration must
be kept beyond the purview of extraneous constraints such as reservation
of any kind and even age restrictions by way of multiple point entries
for different age groups. The guiding principle here is drawing the best
talents from whatever sources without restraints of any kind for the
best results. The services should not be treated as an employment
opportunity to the elite, but as the foundation and pillars of the
government.
HUMAN RESOURCE
The basic source of manpower for these services has to be boys and girls
below the age of 16 years who have completed secondary education. The
selection must be made part of the final secondary examination. The UPSC
must be made responsible for grooming those recruited. The commission
must handle their further academic studies at the government’s expense
for the next seven years to meet the demand of the services.
Identifying the best talents of the country at higher age groups has to
be the goal of the Establishment Cell created within the UPSC on the
lines of the Establishment Officer of the Home Department of the British
Raj. The cell must get busy scouting for best talents from whatever
source for direct absorption to the All India Services at the
appropriate levels after initial training. Outstanding professionals,
technocrats and creative minds of proven calibre can be the candidates.
Every recruit has to be put in independent charge of a subordinate job

for two years under the supervision of a competent senior officer. His
performance in this sphere must from a vital ingredient in the annual
assessment. The trainee must be judged at every stage at different
levels to decide his or her suitability for various jobs.
Five years of regular service after the field training must pave the way
for the first promotion. This must function as a natural filtering
process as those fit should be promoted in the mainstream while others
get elevated to higher ranks in the related subordinate departments to
man posts covered under the Central Services.
Mr.B.K.Nehru, in his memoirs “ Nice Guys Finish Second” refers to an

incident in 1950s wherein the then Finance Minister T.T.Krishnamachari,
asked the chairman of the Central Board of Revenue to show him a
particular income-tax file. The latter refused point blank on the ground
that the law did not allow it. While he agreed that T.T.K. was his
superior, he contended that he himself could see the file as the chief
of the Income-Tax Department while TTK could not as he was not directly
involved with the department. India needs such spirit.
While the Ministers must lay down objectives and policies, their
secretaries must formulate programmes including drafting appropriate
laws and rules to channel the government objectives and policies. The
onus of implementation of the programmes must be left to the departments
concerned.
India, in the pre-independent years needed brilliant people to handle

its administration. British India, with all its brilliant ideas and
administrative wisdom, created the All India Services. It recruited
brilliant people for the services, imparted the best possible training
to them, exposed them to the highest standards of the profession and
presented them the best of trust, powers and opportunities to carry out
their responsibilities. The Government took care of all their personal
needs, provided them with many opportunities for growth and bestowed on
them a halo of invincibility.
The training programmes for the services should be relevant to the time
and highly advanced in content. Subjects taught have to be updated every
year by experts and made challenging even to the brightest among the
members of the services unlike present training programmes which are
intellectually impoverished, irrelevant to the time and do not help tune
attitudes to higher levels. Another need is making the promotional tests
mandatory and of a high standard. Overhauling the present mediocre Union
Police Service Commission to create an efficient and responsible set-up
capable of handling the enormous responsibilities under Article 320 that
compels attention to arrest the degeneration set in, in the set-up that
led to blunders in identifying talents and managing the services.
CREDIBILITY OF THE UPSC
A recent case is from Karnataka where three promising officers from the
state cadre were denied selection by the UPSC to an All India Service
for no obvious reason for ten years from 1990 while their juniors scored
the elevation. The acute frustration and demoralisation caused led to
the break-up of family life of one of the promising trio and subsequent
divorce, repeated violent behaviour by him in public leading to public
humiliation and ultimately involvement in a murder case ending in his
arrest and conviction.
The answer to unprofessional transgressions by the UPSC lies in

transforming it to a highly professional outfit managed by people of
unimpeachable character, efficiency responsibility. The objective can be
achieved by suitable amendment to Articles 316 and 317 to ensure that
only right and sensible people become members and chairman of the
organisation and remain in the saddle only till they retain their moral
and professional calibre.
This can be made possible by the constitution of a committee comprising

the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Chief Commissioner of Central
Vigilance Commission and Speaker of Parliament as members and the
Vice-President of India as the Chairman to clear the names for
appointments as members and chairmen of the UPSC for a fixed tenure and
initiate actions for their removal by an appropriate procedure in fit
cases. Changes to this effect in Articles 316 and 317 plug the loopholes
in the existing provisions that provide too much scope for political
interferences in the selection of members and chairman of the UPSC.
All –India Services as the nerve-centre of the administration has to be

made responsible to an apex body called All India Services apex board.
The board should oversee, supervise, study, control and manage every
affair pertaining to the Services at its own collective wisdom and
discretion with powers of rewards, punishment and placements invested
with it. Sensitive posts in the governments and public undertakings have
to be identified in advance for the All India Services and once it is
done, placements have to be left to the wisdom and discretion of the
apex board. The governments concerned and public undertakings as
employers must keep the apex body constantly and periodically informed
about the performances of each official placed under it and request
changes wherever necessary with reasons therefore. The final decision on
such requests has to be left to the judgement of the apex board based on
its constant research, study, enquiry and assessment.
The best bet for professional resolve and high commitment in such an
apex body is having senior most officers of the All-India Service in
fine fettle as members of the apex board under the seniormost member as
the chairman, appointed strictly on seniority. It is these members with
tow-thirds majority who must be empowered to bar a competent senior
officer from becoming a member or remove an existing member of chairman
from the board by recording sufficient reasons for the act.
Under the new scheme one should be committed to service for life unless
one offers to retire on health or personal grounds or forced out by the
apex board for valid reasons. Except in cases of retirement on request
before the age of 60 years for nonmedical reasons or removal by the apex
board as a punishment, every officer should be entitled to all the
benefits as in service for life even after retirement. However, once
confirmed in the service, one should be prohibited from taking up any
private or other government jobs while in service or after retirement or
even after resignation from the service. These safeguards should be
relaxed only by the apex board.
The country should take cognisance of all the legitimate needs of these
officers and provide them with the best possible living standards.
Instead of salaries, these exceptionally brilliant officers must be
allowed to decide and draw emoluments against performances every month
on their own assessment which include liberal perks such as free
education for children in any kind of educational institution, free
educational supports, free medial aid of whatever kind, free club
membership and other entertainments, free foreigh tours, free housing
and transportation of whatever kind, help to earn permanent assets, free
supplies of daily needs and other movable properties. Each officer must
submit to the apex board a periodical report of his performances. The
board must study each report to judge the officer. It may warn or take
whatever action found necessary.
The Government is doing nothing to arrest the decline of the All India
Services on all fronts. India is preoccupied with myriad issues of
economic and social developments and perhaps the rapid deterioration of
its All India Services does not seem important. But, the Government
should realise that a strong civil service is mandatory for the survival
of India and act fast.
POLICE AND ADMINISTRATION

The police basically is a backup force of the state administration. Its
primary functions are from en arriere. It is the backbone of the state
administration. The police is the enforcer of the rules and laws of the
land and safeguards its compliance by all. For this reason, the police
can be rightly called as the guardian of the state administration. State
administration would be edentate sans the police with none to keep
people on the right sides of the rules and laws of the administration
and make the state administration more than mere paper-work. Even for
the hoi polloi, administration is mostly police functions and nothing in
state administration holds its attention as much as what the police
does. The police is the most visible and the most obvious state
functionary for them, by its striking uniform and prim mien in addition
to its availability as the dernier ressort of the state administration.
The police forms the cutting-edge of the statecraft. The police
functions as both the enforcer of the country’s laws and as the
investigator of the crimes. Ergo, the police both precedes and succeeds
the law enforcement process and ipso facto encompasses the whole gamut
of the state legal system. The very fact that no folds and rumples of
the state administration are excluded from the field of the police
reveals that the range and scope of the policing is as wide as the
administration itself and often exceeds it. Take away the police, the
state administration crumbles and collapses like a messy mass without
backbone. The sine qua non of the police in the statecraft is a widely
recognised fact among the scholars as well as the plebeian.
The inevitability of the police in the statecraft also renders it the

most abused setup in the spectrum of the tools of governance. Control
over the levers of running the police organisation is considered to be a
significant privilege in the realm of state administration. The explains
the range of influence peddling and prolate pressures on police
transfers and keen concours among politicians and others to befriend the
police.
The significance of the police lies in the lowest nature of the work it
does in contrast to the highest degree of awe and weight it commands
among politicians, administrators and the general public. The esteem,
however, worked only to the detriment of the police organisation. The
propinquity to pamper the police while helped the growth and expansion
of the organisation, it certainly spoiled the police setup and crumbled
its professional value system. The development is obvious in
post-independent era for the simple reason that the propensity to paper
the police saw abnormal rise after the country’s reign came to people’s
hands and politicking and political cabals became the rule of the game.
While friendly police became valuable assets to politicians in the
chess-board of the country’s politics, it became the mainstay of the
administration with the gradual fall in the skill and acumen of running
the administration. The police, which once in pre-independent days was
basically a force to keep the freedom fighters at bay and maintain law
and order, became the alter ego of the governance sinsyne.
THE POLICE AND THE CIVILIAN AUTHORITY:
The root of the problem lies in the civilian control of the police; this
control renders the police liable to function at the pleasure of the
civilian authorities against whom also the police are required to
proceed as required by its professional ethics relentlessly in case of
commission of criminal acts. This is a strange position in a disciplined
organisation in which absolute obedience to masters in the most
sanctimonious obligation. Thus the police finds itself in an unenviable
position of being absolutely obedient to its political and civil
masters, antilogous to being ever-ready professionally to proceed
against to put them in the gaol. This is an impossible position for the
police and against the tenets of the human nature. But, this impossibly
contrarious functions are expected from the police The problem is
overcome by advanced countries like the United Kingdom by strict
adherence to the chain of command with the head of the organisation
responsible to the laws of the country while civilian authority has to
be contented with the administrative control of the police. The
safeguard is yet to seep into the police system of democratic Indian.
THE POLICE AND THE MAGISTERIAL POWERS
However, complete insulation of the police from the civilian control may
not be a healthy development per se in a democratic rule. Here, the need
of check over a function through the bifurcation of operation and
control processes in related job a la the bifurcation of accounts and
audit functions in accounts department come to the fore. The police au
fond is arms and muscle of the administration; it basically is an
operational wing of the administration. It is only the watchdog of the
administration. This locus standi of the police imprimis denies it any
job, related with administrative decisions and assessments. The police
is there to obey the orders of the administrative machinery above it to
exercise control over it. A watchdog perforce indicates a master to rein
in. This nature of the police functions necessitates administrative
control over it in the use of force and other enforcement activities.
This is the backdrop of magisterial powers being denied to the police
except where police commissionerates are organised. The demand of the
police to invest it with the magisterial powers is a corpus of the
ongoing dispute. The matter continues to be a contentious issue between
the police and the civil administration and a major source of
dissatisfaction in the police force. The civil administration is
resisting a toute force any attempts to do away the magisterial powers
from its hand in favour of the police, it be in promulgating preventive
orders or issuing search warrants or conducting inquest proceedings or
initiating externment proceedings or initiating preventive proceedings
or ordering the use of force, to name only a few. The argument of the
police is that the denial of the magisterial powers which are exercised
by officers as low as Tahsildars in the civil administration is a
preposterous step sans any rational basis and suggests lack of trust in
the police organisation. The denial of the magisterial powers to the
police has nothing to do with trust or lack of it a la audit control
over accounts function does not suggest lack of trust in accounts. The
police have forgotten that the civilian control over the police is in
step with well established principles of administration and functions as
a safeguard to the hoi polloi against the dangerous overstepping or
overzealous use of police powers, potential of bringing destruction
including death. Use of force by whomever it be, has a tendency to
exceed the limits of requirement and the plebeian has to be protected
from such possibilities. Ergo, the magisterial control over the police.
It is a professional requirement in sound administration rather than an
issue of who is more trustworthy. The resistance of the civil
administration to the demands of the police for the magisterial powers
is justified to that extent. The police commissionerates are special
organisations for special circumstances requiring intensive policing
under the closer scrutiny of the government in charge of civil
authorities. Yet, both magisterial powers and the police powers being
invested in the same hand requiries lots of explanation to be a
convincing administrative arrangement.
PROFESSIONAL POLICING
In professional terms, insulation of the police only implies insulation

from the political control of the police functions. Neither the
magisterial control over the police functions nor the administrative
control of the police force by the civil authorities come under the
meaning of this concept. The symbion between the magisterial control and
the policing functions in one hand and between and administrative
control and the organisational buildup on the other hand is essential
for a healthy police setup. The symbion should stop here. Nothing more.
When it comes to policing by the police per se, when policing operations
demand professional decisions, it should perspicaciously be professional
police decisions sans outside interferences in any form. The police
organisation has to be built up as a system to achieve this essential
goal to make policing a professional, convincing and creditable job
wherein there would be no scope for any outside interferences in
policing with the highest authority in the setup being responsible only
to the rules and laws framed for the purpose a la the policing system in
Britain.
JUDICIARY AND THE POLICE
The position of the police as the enforcer of the laws of the country
gives it an important place in the judicial system of the country in
enforcement of laws, preventive measures and investigation of crimes and
provides it a strategic relationship with the dispenser of laws namely
the judiciary. Though the judiciary has absolutely no say in the
organisational matters of the police force, it, if it so desires and
have adequate resources to do it, can have absolute control over the
police functions as the police au fond is the enforcer of laws and the
judiciary is the interpreter and dispenser of the laws and the synergy
between the two functions perforce implies absolute subordination of the
police functions to the judicial review. However, this may not be the
case in practice for several reasons. One is the concept of judicial
restraint. Another is the constraints within which the judiciary
functions. The other is the disinclination of the judiciary to interfere
with the executive functions of the police unless circumstances compel
it to do so to discharge its cardinal responsibility of upholding the
rule of law and justice in the country.
In the spectrum of the state administration, the police enjoys or

suffers a rather polemic position defying many principles of the
statecraft like the insulation of legislature, executive and judiciary
in the machinery of the state governance or the compatibility between
the constitutional rights invested with the importance enjoyed by a
government organisation in the state administration. The police
organisation on the other hand is the best example of the unity of state
administration, of the synergy of various organs of the state
governance. It, as an enforcer of laws, investigator of crimes and an
apparatus of state security, share a lever with all the pockets of the
statecraft and acts as the spinal chord of the government by
coordinating the functions of the legislature, the executive and the
judiciary in establishing the rule of law. Its bonds with the executive
and the judiciary are equally strong and act as a powerful link between
the two powerful sings of the government. It is a string that binds
disparate wings and organs of the government together and give it a
sense of oneness and belonging while itself remains en arriere. This
explains the sine qua non of the police in state administration while
denying it a ranking place as a governing body sui juris like many other
organs of the state administration. The police as a government agency
represents the driving force of the executive and the controlling device
of the judiciary. It is the working muscle of the government. It
represents the law of the country and therefore ultimately responsible
to the laws of the country. While it is part of the executive, its
subordination to the judiciary and responsibility towards the law of the
country raise it above the scope of the executive functions. While it is
part of the judiciary, its position as a handmaid of the executive,
spreads its role above the scope of the judiciary. Ergo, the police is a
government agency that performs functions both within and above the
scope of the executive and judiciary as well as the legislature. The
police is a government agency that performs functions both within and
above the scope of the executive and judiciary as well as the
legislature. The police is part of all these wings of the government and
subordinate of each to them while outgrow each of them in professional
discharge of its responsibilities. What is required is the realisation
of this sui generis position of the police and preparing itself mentally
to discharge these cardinal responsibilities in compatibility with the
professional requirements.
NEED OF ATTITUDINAL CHANGE IN POLICE

The major problem that confronts extant police is its attitude to work,
responsibilities, profession, organisation, government and the public.
It is confounded about its goals, objectives, loyalties, professional
ethos, job culture, procedures and practices that carry it forward in
the field in attending professional duties. In the wilderness of
undefined roads, Indian police grope for perspicacious directions to
reach professional ends. Popular phrases like maintenance of order,
enforcement of law, prevention of crime, investigation of offences,
protection of security interests etc are too generic terms to carry any
meaning and significance during the process of actual policing.
Perficient policing is possible only in the ambience of well-rounded and
clearly defined specific guidelines for action that help moulding
professional attitude in the organisation. Police develop wrong
attitudes in its absence by erroneous interpretation of the situation
around. This is what happens to Indian police now: wrong attitudes and
concomitant confusion about performing legitimate duties.
A profession like police naturally has its own goals, objectives and
ideals to pursue. They get clouded in the smog of practical turn-arounds
in the field and ultimately lose their edge in the spin of attitudinal
aberrations. The consequence is clashes of loyalties, adoption of
immodest vectors in policing, the issue of excesses and inactions,
tendency to bend rules and laws to achieve perceived ends in the hour of
need of upholding the rule of law, urge to cash-in on the ignorance and
weaknesses of the ignorant people around and indulgences in
unprofessional works in the name of discharging legitimate police
duties. Performance of any profession depends upon three factors:
professional ideals, job culture and actual practices and procedures.
Job culture is spawned of constant interaction of professional ideals
and actual practices and procedures in the field. Though basically is a
product of the past, it considerably affects the future performance of
an orgnisation. Practices and procedures being the primary vehicle of
attitude, they help moulding job culture a la immanent attitude in the
job. The result is a pollent hold of attitude in deciding the direction
of an organisation. A profession loses its raison d’etre while attitude
in the job prevaricates from professional ideals.
Professional ideals of police are rooted in the terra firma of the rule
of law, justice, order and the security of the country and its citizens.
Police organisation is basically responsible to the constitution of the
country and the government constituted and the laws enacted in
accordance with the constitution. Police lose its relevance to the
country when its professional attitude goes against the cardinal ideals
of the profession. The challenge of a police organisation lies in
moulding professional attitude as required by the ideals of the
profession. Wrong attitudes inveterate in extant practices and
procedures of policing are shaped by self-interests, misconceptions,
ignorance and tendency to pursue easy and shortcut methods: they are
hard to be broken and survive under most odds. Only efficient, honest
and highly motivated leadership alone can crack the etui encompassing
it. Once it is done, building a new set of right professional attitudes
is relatively a simpler job to a committed leadership. Basic to these
efforts is a realisation among the top-brass about what constitute right
and wrong attitudes. The crux of the problem of Indian police lies here.
It is distressing to note that the top leadership of post-independent
Indian police is responsible for the prevarication of the organisation
from its professional attitude of absolute commitment to public order
and safety, justice and rule of law to easy and shortcut avenues of
selfish interests. The change percolated downwards. In the rush of
Indians replacing the British to sensitive government positions on the
eve of independence, men of inadequate calibre and merit occupied key
government posts. This happended in police as in other government
departments. The result was happened in police as in other government
departments. The result was corrosion in leadership qualities, traits of
excellence and high personal merits, so essential to run public and
national affairs at the top. It was during this period that Indian
police lost its track in professional policing and exposed itself to the
luxury of dancing to the easy and soft tunes of convenience by yielding
to pressures of political and other vested interests. Policing powers
served as a tool of maximising self-interests and personal comforts at
the cost of professional policing. In the process, the country suffered
and police lost its face.
A major handicap of the extant Indian police is its dependence syndrome.

No more, Indian police realise itself as a master sui juris. For every
piece of work under its sphere of decision, it looks for advice,
guidance and direction from the political leadership, bureaucracy or the
judiciary. It is more a symptom of immanent servilitude and lack of
spine than anything else. Present Indian police lack of hardihood of
professionalism and the self-confidence ensues from it. Policing is not
a job dependant on outsiders like politicians and bureaucrats. For one,
the latter are not professionals and their advice, guidance and
directions in re policing are unlikely to be sound. Secondly, subjecting
policing to their advice, guidance and direction while they themselves
are subjects to policing discipline is unlikely to be in the best
interest of the professional policing. Not that police officers do not
know these facts. They lack the professional resolve to uphold the
purity of the principles of policing au reste being unsure of
themselves. Tendency is to avoid risky responsibilities of policing
while hawks outside are avizefull to make the maximum out of the
weakness of the police and pledge policing responsibilities to those who
sit above them in exchange for secure career prospects. That is shy
meekness and servilitude of police officers in India is pro rata to the
importance of the posts they hold. Somebody cornered or placed in an
insignificant slot has nothing to lose by standing up to his superior
and no need to go servile to anybody unlike somebody in a coveted spot
and therefore not required to protect his position coute que coute. It
is impossible for an upright officer to land in key jobs like chiefs of
police forces in states or the centre save in disturbed provinces like
Punjab and Kashmir. The result is downward slide in professionalism and
perpetuation of servilitude and dependence. Policing worth the name is
possumus only while the glissade in professional resolve is arrested.
But, the vice in which Indian police is caught is too pollent to be
breached. The dependence syndrome has to be replaced by professional
resolve. This requires change of attitude. The change is not easy to
come in present vicious circumstances. Without it coming soon, Indian
police has no deliverance.
A serious handicap of present Indian police is its noncommittal and

causal reliance on mechanical procedures sans passion for professional
objectives. Tendency is to show the amount of labour put to a job rather
than showing results. There is no true passion to reach goals and
achieve professional objectives of safety, security, justice and the
rule of law. Every attempt is to do minimum required so that the chances
of being caught committing mistakes are minimal. Procedures and
practices form the staple and there is no spark for creative policing.
Policing has become a mechanical process sans substance. It is the
minimum common denominator that counts in present policing environment.
The passion natural for those in police for public security and order,
rule of law and justice is seldom felt in Indian police of the present
vintage. Risk-taking which is a common trait of good policing has become
a rarity and a scarce commodity. The problem lies in wrong attitude. The
atrophy set in, in the field of committed policing has become the
mainstay of the Indian police. Reversing the trend is the first priority
to bring Indian police on the right rails.
A manifestation of this wrong attitude is evident in investigation of
crimes. The reason for the problem lies in the environment in which
investigators function. They are prosecutors of another kind in real
terms in Indian police environment and work to collect evidence of
whatever merit to prove that the persons accused of crime had committed
the crime rather than unearthing truth. Persons under investigation are
treated as criminals and harassed. When sound evidences are not
available, anything that goes for evidence is trumped up. The infamous
Jain Hawala case is a case in point. The case was cold-stored for years.
The dependence syndrome of the premier investigation agency of the
country prevented it from investigating the case sans clearance from
political masters. Once polictical bigwigs calculated that investigation
of the case was in their interests, CBI proceeded full-steam to prove
the case. When direct evidence was not available, CBI probed for
circumstantial evidences. When circumstantial evidence failed to prove
anything, CBI went for anything available to feed its fanciful
interpretations. Need of corroboration was thrown to the wind. Political
leaders were tried on the basis of initials and numbers entered in a
diary. Court of law exonerated the politicians for lack of evidence. In
the process, many heads rolled on the block of the political gameplan.
Professional attitude to investigation with a passion for fairplay,
objectivity, truth and justice would have saved the country from the
quite unnecessary hardships. Politically sensitive cases are taken up
for investigation only when people in power decide in favour, and
investigated with a particular end in sight and chargesheeted on the
basis of whatever little could be gathered in the name of evidence.
Professional investigation is not meant to proceed in this fashion where
possibility of a prima facie case and quality of evidences precede every
thing else and decide the course and pace of the investigation process
and chargesheet. Sensitisation to fairplay, objectivity, truth and
justice is the foundation of the professional policing. Professional
police display extraordinary scruple in exercise of policing powers like
arrests, bails, searches, seizures, interrogations etc so that law bites
only the hors la loi and innocent citizens go absolutely unharmed. It is
not the case in Indian police now. Investigation has become a one-way
track of somehow raising evidences and chargesheeting, truth and justice
become tragedies in the process. This basically is a problem of wrong
attitude.
People caught in the web of criminal laws deserve sympathy and kindness
until they are proved guilty beyond doubts. They need to be treated with
gentleness and courtesy that behoves to interpresonal relationship in a
civilised society while the process of investigation continues with all
efficiency and ruthless exactitude. Police as investigator is not
invested with powers to punish for the crimes committed. Fair chance to
persons under investigation to prove their innocence goes a long way in
unearthing truth and solving crimes justly. This has to be the attitude
of the police during crime investigation. Truth and justice have to be
their goal. Indian police lack the maturity and poise.
A serious Achilles’ heel of Indian police is its perverted attitude

towards rules and laws. Bending rules and laws to suit self interests is
one dimension of the spiel. Another dimension is its blind application
sans sense of proportion and discreetness while self-interest is not an
issue. It is seen in enforcing laws and maintaining order. Police forget
that rules and laws are just tools in the larger cause of peace and
order of the society and sadly handle laws for law’s sake. Rules and
laws are invested on police like weapons as the dernier ressort while
all other avenues are shut. Discreetness in their constraint. Objectives
are primary Rules and laws must follow them only as tools to that end.
The realisation is rarely found in the present police. It operates laws
for law’s sake by relegating organisational objectives to oblivion.
Professional objectives suffer and police become an object of
detestation consequential to this perverted attitude. Mechanical
enforcement of gratuitous rules and laws constrict the freedom of people
for no specific purpose and weaves an unnecessary web of constraints
around them for nobody’s good. The attitude is fatal to fair and
professional policing practices and needs to be corrected on priority to
make application of rules and laws need-based in reaching professional
targets.
Another field where police need to change its attitude is its contempt
for human values. Policing is just an instrument to the cause of
protecting human values. Police oblivious to this fact, subject human
values to immane policing methods in the name of policing. Third degree
methods are the point. Malfeasances do not behove to the cause of human
values. Means are as important as ends in policing. Pursuing unjust
means for the cause of justice is the spiel of the frankenstein, the
story of an off-spring eating its creator. Inviolable commitment to
human values and rights is the foundation of good policing. Human touch
is sine qua non for professional policing. Human concern is the raison
d’etre of good policing. The shift in attitude needs to be from blind
and blanket-policing for the policing’s sake to discreet and enlightened
policing to reach professional objectives. The shift has to be from the
use of policing powers to maximise professional goals. The shift must
see police taking risks in the interests of the profession and doing
intelligent policing rather than indulging in manoeuvres of personal
security. The process warrants massive exercise in attitudinal change.
What constitutes perficient exercises of attitudinal change in a massive

organisation like the police? Police organisation is a tough and
hard-to-crack candidate for any manipulations. It is a no nonsense
outfit. The only way to bring it to senses is intensive and extensive
appeal to its reason and emotion to convince about the need of change.
Police rely on past practices and procedures. It looks for the job
culture to aemule. Forcing police away from vicious practices and
procedures and undesirable job culture through the attitudinal change is
an arduous and time consuming exercise even for experts in the field.
The exercise has to be a multi-pronged attack on inveterate
misconceptions and wrong notions in extant policing by extensive
exposures to talks, discussions, seminars, briefings, studies,
researches and in-service training involving analyses of policing, its
ideals, objectives, methods, means and ends, social relevances,
pressures, policing environment, psychological aspects of policing etc.
The exercise have to be intended to provoke police personnel to think
about their profession without dogma and arrive at desirable conclusions
about professional policing and impress them on the ingredients of good
policing by constant exposure. A few ideal cases as models have
tremendous impact on the cause of creating eight attitudes, Studies and
researches on policing and policing methods provide a sound foundation
to these exercises. A police organisation interested in improving its
quality and performance cannot go without sound study centres and
research projects on the issues of policing. These attempts provide both
inputs and insight to the behavioural pattern of the police in field
under different situations and stress patterns as differentiated from
what are desired. They bring both gestalts to contrast in terms of their
perficiency, professional needs and relevance to the environment of
policing to affect attitudinal change in right direction by way of
conviction. The immediate need is inducing doubts about the soundness of
existing attitudes to encourage discussion on the topic. Deliberate
guiding through structured mental exercises to desirable end forms the
latter part of the task. Indeed, the whole exercise has to be planned
and executed in detail by highly efficient leadership in the police. The
conundrum is who behoves to handle the highly responsible job while the
leadership of the police itself is mired in wrong attitudes to the job
of policing.
Problem of attitude basically is a problem felt at higher wrungs in

top-brass of the force. The stiff hierarchical order and
command-obedience pattern of functioning make the lower wrungs
irrelevant in matters of job attitude. Those down the ladder are loyal
followers and obedient operators in the path and policy laid above them.
Their attitudes change shape from case to case to meet the demands
trickle from above. When the demand is to let out a rich and powerful
criminal with royal honours, those down the level do just that with
vengeance; when the demand from above is to frame an innocent man and
obtain his confession by subjecting to torture, they just do that with
dedication for the sake of a well-earned pat of their omniscient
superiors. It is again a question of ill-conceived job culture and
attitude which need to be corrected as it is tangible to the standards
of policing as all organisational matters are. The primary target of
attitudinal change is the higher wrungs and the top-brass. Others follow
and fall to place. The key lies in the realisation that something is
wrong in the present mode of policing. Demolition is the beginning of
the construction. Once the realisation of wrong dawns upon,
reconstruction becomes possible. Police being an extrovert and
action-oriented outfit, self-analyses and inward-looking tendencies do
not come easily. While things to wrong, introversion becomes sine qua
non for healthy growth. This is what is required in Indian police now.
INDIAN POLICE: WHAT COURSE TO PURSUE IN

THE 21ST CENTURY?
With the accrescent demands for limited resources of the Earth and
concomitant concours for survival in the world of the survival of the
fittest, the advent of the new century is bound to herald ascensive
economic bewilderments in the crucible of hotting up social
complexities. Reintepretation of life in the complex environment of
technical advancements, systemic and structural changes in society and
spurts in criminal activities is likely to provide the paramenters of
the coming age and determine the quality of life in the coming century.
The police, as the custodians and enforcers of the safety of life and
property, have to move pari passu with the time for perficient handling
of the emerging situation. They cannot afford to adapt to challenges as
and when they are posed as in vogue in government service. Assessment of
situations ahead, defining the future challenges and deriving means to
checkmate them in advance form the basic tenets of good policing and are
sine qua non with the survival of the country and its peaceful life.
The piece de resistance of future policing has to be perficient

performance with minimal visible presence. This means a far more
professional organisation than now. This means far more skilled policing
than now. This means better management of the police organisation,
better equipped force, men of higher calibre and devotion to work and
more contented people manning the police hierarchy.
20th Century saw the expansion of the utility of the police to every
conceivable field of human activity in social and national life.
Security duties are increasingly encompassing ceremonial objectives.
Traffic and law and order police are more and more replayed to add
grandeur and humour to private functions of the well-to-do and powerful.
The presence of the police is becoming more a matter of prestige and
social standing in society than an emergent need of protection. The
police are now called to mediate and solve familial problems, labour
disputes and case and communal differences. People call them now to
intervene in their differences with others, expect them to handle rescue
operations during natural accidental and man-made calamities. Their
services are warranted to bring order wherever and whenever things go
wrong at public as well as private events with unending number of acts,
rules and their amendments passed every year by the legislatures. This
wide use of the police in the vast spectrum of the statecraft rendered
it jack of all and master of none. The transformation blunted the
effectiveness of the police in handling its cardinal duties of providing
security, maintenance of order and investigation of crimes.
Policing is presently seen as an unintellectual exercise with a flare

for brawn, ruthlessness and derring-do. Reality is not very different
from this image. The situation certainly does not do in the future
complex societal network as the breeding ground for complicated criminal
activities warranting skilled and intelligent policing. The Police of
the 21st century have to be manned by highly intelligent and brainy
species of men should it be feracious in meeting challenges and showing
results. The change, apart from improving the quality of policing, will
bring respect to the job in addition to the present awe and fear, the
police inspire. An overhaul of selection and training policies to infuse
and buildup mental and intellectual strains in the manpower of the
police should be the bedrock of the efforts to snod the organisation to
meet the challenges of the future.
The paramount need of the future police is a professional image tout au

contraire to present image as a handmaid of rich and powerful. What is
required is a perspicacious definition of police duties and
responsibilities and relegating the force to perform the duties under
the avizefull eyes of the constitution without the distractions of
interferences ab extra. The police should have free hand to tackle and
solve issues cropping up during the process of policing with concomitant
responsibility for any failures squarely lying on its shoulders.
Hi-tech policing is another imperative of the 21st century. Police

cannot afford to lose ground to criminals in the field of hi-tech.
Efficiency of policing is pro rata to competence to perform in a given
situation in meeting challenges offered. The competence necessarily
implies moving pari passu with the fast changing hi-tech environment in
the fields of transport, communication, weaponry and detection system.
Police can ignore this need only at its own peril.
The growth of police in the 20th century is marked by its insulation

from the intellectual explosions of the age. Police is seldom touched by
the zeist geist. Policing methods and ideas remained stagnant throughout
the century sans effective voice raised to infuse new spirit to the body
of the police. The century saw no concrete and concerted efforts to
bring crime investigation on modern lines. The problem of human rights
violations remained a major blot on the policing process throughout the
century. Use of third degree methods in interrogations sullied the image
of the police in a century which brought revolutionary changes in the
concepts of human dignity, equality, justice for all and basic rights.
The image of the police in the 20thcentury is that of a licensed
criminal syndicate run by the government to checkmate unlicensed
criminal activities.
Indian legislatures churn out new legislations and bring out amendments
threeon in such numbers and festination that neither those legislatures
nor the police who enforce them can afford to keep a track of the
enactments and their provisions. This Achilles’ heel in the law
enforcement machinery will perforce disappear in years ahead. A solution
is creation of the Community Police as enforcers of the social
legislations as distinct from the body police. The community Police
require skills different from those in general policing owing to the
special nature of the social legislations and special sensitivities of
its enforcement. The huge share of the social legislations among new
enactments and the gargantuan task of enforcing them is another
justification for creating a separate community police wing out of the
present police. The measure will relieve the body police from lots of
work-pressures and provide it spare time and energy to concentrate on
vital issues of the general policing.
Another task ahead to attend tout de suite is sewing the investigating

responsibilities and the prosecution duties to a single whole.
Inter-departmental co-operation though specious in theory on paper, it
is exceptions in field in the Indian environment of interdepartmental
jealousy and rivalry. The police with the need of prompt responses and
quick decisions vis a vis the complex nature of emerging crimes cannot
do for long with the extant system of the police and the prosecution
pulling apart from opposite directions in the race for one-upmanship.
The key to the success of the police is its response time, the speed
with which it responds to the challenges of the crime. Where time is a
precious commodity and a difference of a couple of seconds make the
difference of success and failure of a police operation, persistent
efforts to shorten response time will get the highest priority. The
thrust of the police administration of the next millennium will be
directed to bettering the response time as speed will be the mainstay of
crimes and criminals of the coming age. Short response time implies
improved communication and transport network and highly motivated human
resources ever-ready to handle challenges. Outmoded communication and
transport facilities in disrepair conditions most of the time have no
relevance there and casual manpower is rather passe in that ambience.
The millennium will see the police force in the finest fettle in terms
of orgtanisation, manpower and equipments and becoming a highly
organised efficient limb of the state apparatus.
The 21st century police will be required to shed to idee fixe for the
show of strength in lieu of efficient policing. The stress in future
will be on lean and fit policing. The structural deformity and oveweight
caused by redundant posts, undefined jobs, lack of accountability,
epinosic equation of rights and responsibilities, top-heavy structure,
erratic span of control, demotivating factors, nonprofessional ambience
and uninspiring leadership will become a matter of the past with the
police going perforce competitive en face gargantuan challenges from
criminals posing threat to the raison d’etre of the police and its
relevance to the extant society.
Going hi-tech to match the gauntlets of the crime world is another

possibility open for the police of the 21st century. The age will see
the needs of investigation process expanding the horizons of science and
technology rather than the other way round. Gene tests will become a
strategic and commonly employed tool of investigation against crimes
relating to bodily harm, paternity and even bodily associations. Laser
guns will come handy in handling violent law and order issues.
Night-vision instruments will become an essential part of the
investigation and security operations kits to be handled by every
policeman. The age may see police using eaves-dropping instruments to
overhear unsuspecting people from distance. “X-ray eyes’ aid viewing
across walls or closed doors. Computers will become an integral part of
the routine as well as special police works and police stations. Police
may see software devised to guide investigating officers in
investigating every kind of crime at every level. Helicopters and
mini-aeroplanes will become common mode of transportation for carrying
investigating teams, deployment of security staff and airlifting armed
forces to disturbed places as time becomes precious and criminals become
ingenious in dodging the police.
An important possibility of the next millennium is the police becoming

an elite force with even its bottom levels being manned by highly
qualified, skilled and enlightened professionals as a result of the
pampering ahead for the police in the administrative hierarchy.
Constabulary will be spruced to striking forces and manual works without
policing powers. With it, may go the pernicious misuse of the
constabulary as household assistants. Single-point recruitment will come
to vogue with linear promotions from the lowest to the highest ranks on
the basis of merit and actual performances in the field as assessed by a
panel of distinguished public figures, constituted for the purpose.
A cost-efficient manpower policy in future police administration will

bring motivation and commitment centre-stage. The extant diffident
response of maximum mobilisation or raising of new units under every new
challenge will give way to perficient strategies and tactics. The
present tendency of doing minimum required in a given situation unless
otherwise compelled by the situation amounts to criminal wastage of
manpower. The 21st century will require every single policeman straining
his best with a sense of motivation and commitment in the interests of
superior policing.
Motivation and commitment are derivatives of self-actualisation in the

need hierarchy postualted by Maslow. Pride of performance can be a
reality only while lower physical, security and social needs cease to be
issues. Indian police planners have no alternatives to grooming the
police manpower of the next century to this level of sans souci. This
means good living conditions, job security and sound social status. The
police must find a respectable place in the hierarchy of state
administration and shed away the extant obnoxious image of odd-job-man
of the government as well as political leaders to inspire awe and
respect in the hoi polloi. The transformation is sine qua non with the
new age.
Creating a self-contained police machinery in place of the present mere

nuts and bolts of the administration is cardinal need ahead. The nasty
political and bureaucratic interferences in professional policing have
done no good to the country and its police in the last five decades.
Insulating the police from the vice prise of ectogenetic pressures and
influences needs to be a reality in the coming decades should the police
have relevance in the governance of the country. This is possible only
by the metamorphosis of the police to an independent body with goals and
objectives perspicuously defined and laid down. The new police have to
be responsible only to the constitution through a suitable machinery of
checks and counterchecks exercised by constitutional bodies manned by
people of proven track-record in matters of integrity, competence and
other mental attributes and chosen from academic, bureaucratic and
political fields as well as public life. The change may bring a
semblance of justice and fairplay to administration and ipso facto
infuse a value system to Indian public life and bring the fear of god to
force strict adherence to probity and the rule of law in public life.
India has no alternative to this metamorphosis should the country
survive the moral crisis and degringolade of national spirit, it
witnessed since independence.
INDIAN POLICE AND FIFTY YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE
Independence circa half a century back marks the greatest turning point
in the history of Indian police. It marks the end of 88-year history of
policing on modern lines under the British Raj which began with the
enactment of the Madras District Police Act of 1859 and assumed
countrywide acceptance with the enactment of the Police Act of 1861.
Independence marks the beginning of the history of Indian police under
Indian hands in a democratic milieu unlike of yore though in form and
contents they were its continuation. The hitch lay in its sprit, in the
contradictions of the intentions of a colonial police and the traditions
of a democratic police. It patently is against jus naturale to expect a
colonial police transform to a democratic setup overnight with the
awakening of the country at midnight. Spirit is never known to be a
quick-chameleonic, particularly while form and contents maintain their
stead. Change in spirit is the natural outcome of changes in ambience
leading to metamorphosis of value system and attitudes by rapid
exposures to changed experiences. The process perforce requires a very
long period of trails and tribulations to ripen the spirit to its new
avatar. The first fifty years of independence of India marks this period
in context of the spirit of Indian police maturing to democratic
traditions in the hands of Indian rulers.
RISE OF CLANDESTINE OPERATIONS
It is significant that the history of police of sovereign India begins

immediately posterior to the turbulent years of the second world war
which opened up or saw expansion of a new vista of duties for the police
worldwide. The most kenspeckle of them is clandestine operations in
international scale for national security. Though the history of
intelligence collection and covert operations go as far back as human
history itself and stand next only to prostitution as the oldest
profession practised by man, it flowered, expanded and received
worldwide plaudite as an established tool of statecraft only during and
after the maelstrom of the second world war with Germany, the Soviet
Union and Britain before and during the war and the United States and
Israel after, perfecting the techniques. The raising of the Central
Intelligence Agency(CIA) in the United States
in the early years of 1950”s from the crumbs of the old American secret
service of the second world war vintage, the Office of Special Services
(OSS), with an elaborate Plans division to handle gray clandestine
operations abroad (sometimes domestic operations also) marked a long
step in the history of international twilight operations. Following
words spelled out by the Hoover Commission during those momentous days
form the agenda of secret police service all over the world. The
commission, in justfication of postern operations, said, “ There are no
rules in such a game. Hitherto acceptable norms of human conduct do not
apply. If the US is to survive, longstanding American concepts of fair
play’ must be reconsidered. We must develop effective espionage and
counter-espionage services. We must learn to subvert, sabotage and
destroy our enemies by more clever, more sophisticated and more
effective methods than those used against us. It may become necessary
that the American people be acquainted with, understand and support this
fundamentally repugnant philosophy”.
COVERT OPERTIONS OF INDIAN POLICE
Free India, in spite of its moral values and abiding impact of Gandhian
Philosophy of truth and honesty, found covert operations sine qua non
for survival. Though attempts were scratchy in inchoate stages, India
made significant breakthroughs in penetrating, moulding and controlling
the affairs of the neighbouring countries after raising the Research and
Analysis Wing (RAW) to handle covert operations in foreign countries.
Its operations and performances in Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Pakistan
and to somewhat lesser extent in Afghanistan, Nepal, Bhutan, Burma and
some of the Gulf countries are on par with the best in the world. Its
chevisance in international events like the creation of Bangladesh,
containment of Eelam ambitions of Sri Lankan Tamils in India,
eheckmating the Kashmir card of Pakistan and controlling the terrorist
misadventures of international Sikh communities against Indian targets
earned it worldwide accolades. This is in spite of the fact that Indian
secret police is a feather-weight performer in the arena of
international clandestine wars and its overall performance in world
events is very unimpressive for the size and resources of the country.
Reasons are many. Foremost of them is lack of commitment to the national
cause and national ideologies like national integration, democracy,
secularism, nonaligned movement and mixed economy. Another reason is the
moral atrophy experienced by Indian police after independence leading to
decline in professional commitments. Postings to RAW with opportunities
of foreign assignments has become a status symbol and lost all substance
of challenges and performances from it. The other reason is political
interferences in postings to and transfers of the RAW officials. It is
political connections rather than security screening and clearances and
aptitude for clandestine operations decide the postings in the RAW. Huge
unbudgeted and unaccounted funds at disposal makes the RAW postings
highly lucrative and attracts easy going siblings of the powerful to its
fold. This is an extremely dangerous trend in a security apparatus where
commitment, trust and absolute secrecy form the basics of survival and
an unguarded moment may make life and death difference for many. More
important, clandestine operations unlike other police responsibilities
require highly specialised skills, ignoring this need in manning the
organisation is a sure way of compromising the organisation, betraying
its operational efficiency and exposing the country to dangerous
security threats. Another important reason for the retarded growth of
Indian secret police is the general lack of security consciousness in
the country and inability to see and place the imperatives of a national
security policy in right perspective. These glitches end-up in security
breaches of the dimension of ISRO spy case Purulia arms drop case.
Rattan Sehgal episode etc. India lacks larger horama of the country and
its survival needs and goes algate weighed down with ephemeral
considerations. Its approaches to national security are always
piecemeal, incoherent, causal and disturbingly unsound. It does not have
a sound and well-conceived national security policy. Its approach to
security threats are always short-term face-saving responses which never
contribute for the real long –term security needs of the country. If it
is the situation at government level, people who fought a mighty power
to the situation at government level, people who fought a mighty power
to liberate their country from the yoke of foreign rule just half a
century back care nevermore about even saving what they gained then from
the internal and external inimical forces by as much as raising a public
debate on the subject of the imperatives of national security. Indian
security now is left to the mercy of time and it is sheer luck that
Indian democracy survived for long decades from the hungry wolves
waiting to fall and prey on it.
NATIONAL SECURITY POLICY
National security policy is the craze of super powers of the world

today. It is the essence and unifying factor behind all national
policies of most developed as well as developing countries. Whether it
is foreign policy, defence police, economic policy, industrial policy,
trade and commerce policy, science and technology policy or human
resources development policy, they are all oriented with an eye on
national security and implemented to boost the national security goals.
Most developed countries have exclusive super agencies reporting
directly to the head of the government to advise on, oversee and
mastermind national security policies and its operations. The US has the
National Security Agency (NSA) doing yeoman service to the country as
the national security advisor to the president of the country and enjoys
powers superior even to the CIA in national affairs. Israel and Russia
have their efficient equivalents at political levels to formulate their
national security interests. Most developed countries have created their
own gestalts to mastermind matters touching national security interests
with powers invested to override decisions of other departments when
national security interests are at stake. India is yet to learn lessons
from these developments.
PARALLEL POWER CENTRE

The excessive concern for national security in some countries often led
to the creation of parallel governments and power centres ectogenous of
the democratically instituted governments. There are instances of black
acts committed against legitimate policies of the countries in the garb
of national security as in the US, and civilian governments toppled and
constituted at will eo nomine as in Pakistan. Pakistan is an example of
constitutionally elected government living under the shadow of fear of
its secret police, the ISI, which assumed on itself the apocryphal
responsibilities of Pakistan’s national security. The blackest days of
twilight operations in the name of national security were seen by the US
when a pollent section of the Plans Division of its own CIA with the
cooperation of crime syndicates and Cuban hors la loi, assassinated its
young and popular president John. F.Kennedy in 1963 en revanche of the
latter’s opposition to the CIA-inspired Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba and
pro-peace overtures to the them Soviet Union. A positive aspect of
India's’poor concern to security interests is its clean slate as far as
existence of secret parallel governments and clandestine power- centres
are concerned. It is to the credit of Indian police that its secret
police remained subordinate and loyal to their legitimate authorities in
the last half century since independence. It per se is a remarkable
accomplishment.
INDIAN SECURITY CONCERNS
This does not mean that everything is all right with Indian security
agencies. Their filed for operation continues to be confined to
traditional isolative methods ignoring the present needs of integrated
approach in national policies and programmes. This is a dangerous trend
in the present competitive world where even a minor edge over the
opponent makes the difference of elimination and survival for a country.
While even developed countries made all aspects of their national
policies subordinate to their security interests, India cannot afford to
subordinate its security concerns to the freaks of people who come to
head various ministries in government and their political and personal
ideologies. India lacks in a cadre of long range security programmes to
make its security operations meaningful and purposeful. It is lagging in
hi-tech ultra-secret espionage operations far behind world standards and
nowhere comes near even to the old U-2 spy plane of the US of 1950’s .
Its secret police is yet to make perficient use of the country’s
impressive progresses in fields like satellite launches to the outer
space and other space programmes. Except for isolated cases as in
Pakistan, India is yet to fully utilise the services of world-class
mercenaries in its clandestine operations as in vogue in almost all
major gray operations worldwide. Security services in India unlike other
countries world over, do not weigh high in the national priorities of
the country.
SPECIAL BRANCHES
This affairs are worse in Special Branches or intelligence units of

states and union territories. Special Branches have become pure and
simple tools of political intelligence of ruling parties with
surveillance over political opponents and assessment of field situations
for the benefit of political masters becoming the piece de resistance at
the cost of law and order concerns accrescently losing importance in the
portfolio of their responsibilities. As far as internal security is
concerned, they are rather passe and ill equipped for the task in
manpower resources, hi-tech equipments, expertise, organisational
efficiency and motivation factors, save some routine VIP security
exercises sans any expertise in it. That is also meant just to oblige
and gratify political masters and provide grandeur to their presences.
Their assets in news media which is sine qua non for a sound Special
Branch is rather impoverished and mostly confined to local newspapers
for the purpose of disinformation and keeps track of news dissemination.
Occasionally, these contacts are misused to promote favourite
subordinates as authors or experts in a discipline. The ambition of
these Special Branches providing skilled recruits to security agencies
at the national level remains a far-fetched dream in the situation of
gross unconcern for national security commitments.
PERMANENT CORE GROUP FOR NATIONAL SECURITY
Institution of an all-powerful apolitical agency for national security

with a permanent core group of security experts of proven commitments to
the cause of the country as the nucleus at the highest level as the
guide and advisor in national security matters to the head of the
government a la the NSA of the US with over-riding powers can alone
change the situation for free India and lead it safely to the centennial
of its independence. Efforts made to this end till now are rather
sketchy, ill-conceived and half-hearted. It is high time now that
spade-works are initiated to institute a comprehensive agency in India
for handling national security concerns.
EMPHASIS ON VIP SECURITY
National security for all practical purposes in India is synonymous with

VIP security and Indian police vocabulary refuses to read for it any
meaning much beyond protecting leaders. This is because of the lopsided
loyalties and aberrations in Indian police in understanding professional
objectives and responsibilities of the police at best and a tendency to
trade off professional responsibilities and services for the benefits of
career promotions of a few at worst. That is why units for the security
of different kinds of VIPs like Black Cats, National Security Guards and
Special Protection Group are raised from time to time. While security of
national leaders is an important role of a national security policy, it
is not the only plank on which the national security concerns stand.
There are many more important and vital roles a national security policy
is called to assume and sidelining those aspects for the sake of a
single role of political clout is suicidal tot he country’s security
interests. It is public knowledge in India how VIP security has become a
public farce with all kinds of people with some lobbying muscle striving
and obtaining a security classification depending on the type of money
and power they have so that they get the cover of highly trained police
personnel as a caract of their prestige and social standing. It has to
be understood that all matters concerned with national security are
highly sensitive and considerably grave entities and need to be treated
as such. They should not be allowed to stoop to epideictic exercises for
the benefit of a few powerful as witnessed in democratic India. Such
abuses lower the gravity of national security commitments. National
security has to be treated and respected as a matter of highest priority
and insulated from the trifle fancies of superficial leaders. The
strength and relevance of national security to the country lie in its
esoteric and purposeful operations; not in pandering to the superficial
needs of a powerful few.
VIP SECURITY AS A SHOW BUSINESS
VIP Security has become such a craze in Indian police that it

incorporates all wings of the national police force in its body, it be
central police, state police or district police, it be security police,
Special Branch, striking forces, investigating agency or law and order
police. In the process, other police functions rapidly lose importance
as the pressures of VIP security mount up with the number of dignitaries
and their spheres of activities expand with the accommodation of more
and more influential people and their kith and kin under pressures as
VIPs. All said and done, these VIP securities are nothing but shams
meant only as epideictic ensemble without any substance as far as real
protection is concerned in the present age of hi-tech terror.
The period saw no substantial progress in expansion and reorganisation

of the district police. There are much to be done in the field, both in
strengthening the organistion and cleansing it. Policing at this level
comes in daily contact with the hoi polloi, and for them police means
the district police. The police at this level really form the image of
the police for the common man. Unfortunately, corruption is rampant in
district police, because of the powers invested in it to control the
daily affairs of the people. The power breeds corruption; and the
corruption breeds mad rush to man key positions in district police. In
magnitude also, the district police form the biggest slice of the police
force in the country.
The serious maladies witnessed in secret police and investigation

agencies of India are actually common symptoms of the atrophy observed
in all wings of Indian police including the law and order police.
Dishonesty, lack of professional commitment, extra-professional
loyalties and unchecked corruption are the albatross that commonly
suffer Indian police at all levels. It is not a rosy picture to have to
a police force more than a century old and now reaching half a century
mark of existence in a free country. The deterioration of Indian police
is steep after independence. Perhaps, democratic rule in the country
sinsyne has not done any good to Indian police. The nexus of police with
criminals and politicians is smothering and squeezing the country and
its public life out of its vitality to a stage of paralysis. While the
virus is coram populo in states like Bihar and UP, it is eating up the
vitals of the country in other states ab intra. No part of the country
is free from this slow process of sphacelus. The talk of private armies
during elections in UP and Bihar is indicia to the confidence Indian
police inspire in public after fifty years of self-rule. Indian police
in 1990s appear like a century-old giant tree rendered hollow ab intra
by the temite of corruption. Unless something is done fast to return the
vitality of the professional pride and commitment, Indian police may
irrevocably fail the country in leading it forth to the century-mark of
India’s independence.
INDIAN INTERNAL SECURITY BUILDUP

The article deals with the organisation, management and
operations of intelligence network in reference to India
and its significance in safeguarding the internal security
of the country. Efforts are made to trace the Achilles’
heel in the organisation and functioning of the present
intelligence build-up in India and how it has to be handled
to strengthen the internal security machinery of the country
is discussed in the article with emphasis on selection of
right people, right training, right motivation, right planning
and right preparations before each field action. The intricacies
of intelligence operations are also discussed in three distinct
levels namely intelligence gathering, research & planning and
field operations with reference to their importance to the
internal security.
The police force in India was raised imprimis to tackle crime and law
and order problems. Its recruitment, training and on-the field
experience programmes stress upon the elements required to tackle those
problems. The Indian police organisation, in its stiff hierarchical
order and discipline, is geared to meet these challenges. There is
little scope in the present police for the growth of an aptitude other
than for these déjà vu function. No effort was made to overhaul the
police even after security challenges have superated in their primacy in
police functions. It should be borne in mind that the demands on the
police to meet security challenges are tout a fait distinct from the
demands to which the Indian police has long been accustomed. The
aptitude required to protect targets from determined esoteric strikes by
terrorists is antipodal with the aptitude required for the show of
strength, necessary to suppress a loosely knit mob of wankle
law-breakers. In spite of these excessive strains on the Indian police,
its organisation and resources, due to the dangerous spurt in security
threats, it unfortunately has failed to abraid and overhaul its system
to face the new challenges. The glitches of the Indian police in
internal security are obvious by the fact that Indian soil has become a
fertile ground to breed and feed terrorist organisations. Every corner
of India has its own terrorist outfit and each of these outfits has
proved itself a pernicious challenge to the Indian police. Never, even
by chance has the Indian police shown that it can control a terrorist
outfit. The fact is that even all armies of the world together cannot
bring a terrorist outfit to heel, unless the soft belly of the terrorist
outfit is subtly hit embusque by intelligent operations. Sadly, the
Indian police is yet to realise this fact.
Sabotage, terrorism and security risks are not phenomena, pro tempore.
They are here to stay and the police must know to meet the situations
they engender. And threats to internal security, by all means will
assume demonic proportions as time advances. The
survival of the police in coming years depends upon its ability to meet
the needs of internal security. It has no alternative but to overhaul
its passe system, organisation, operational methods, approach to work,
training and manpower resources to be able to do so. The faster it is
done, the better. For, the inability of the police in successfully
handling security challenges is resulting in fatalities almost every
day.
The first parameter for preparing the police for the future challenges
of the internal security is selecting right people with right aptitude,
right abilities and right background. This requires thorough job
analysis in the requirements to handle the pertinent responsibilities.
Choosing the right man from the motley to inclip him to the ergon forms
the foremost need of preparing the police for the impending challenges.
It should be realised that the need of such people to the police
overweighs the need of the police for these extra-ordinary species. As
internal security is a condition of national survival, no law, no
fundamental right, no directive principle nor any social welfare
ideologies should interfere with the recruitment of the right people.
Internal security being a highly sensitive and secretive job, each less
than right man inside is a positive risk to security operations. Further
, such people are a drain on the efficiency and effectiveness of the
organisation. Ergo, avoiding people less than right for the job is as
important in recruitment as selecting the right person.
The people who fit-in to internal security responsibilities must have an

innate trait to give themselves to the job that they take up. They must
be sensitive people with a high commitment to their responsibilities
with the mental and physical ability to fulfil the task. Men of high
intelligence quotient, patience, aplomb and perseverance have to be
immanent in their nature. A profound sense of patriotism is an added
qualification. However, not many people having these rare qualities are
readily available. It must be a sacred duty of the security operators to
ingest such rara avis to the organisation wherever they are found and
with whatever sacrifice. It is possible only if recruitment to these
places are made a postern affair at the highest level without throwing
recruitment open to competitions where all types of people sneak in for
various reasons. Internal security, more often than not, is an envious
profession wherein life is committed to its objectives.
In the circumstances, the indraught to the fold must be agraste with

respect and behoofs in form of liberal purses and perks apart from more
than generous promotional and death-cum-retirement benefits that behove
to the compulsive commitment sine qua non for the job. This helps to
widen the latitude of choice by promising a belle vue which is puerile
to its demands to the aspirants to this difficile career.
Having suitable manpower is one thing. Preparing them for the future
challenges is quite another. It is here that training comes into
picture. Training high-calibre, sensitive people is a much more
responsible and arduous job. If the training is to prepare them for
sensitive job like internal security, the gravity of the task gets
further compounded by the addition of another dimension to the
responsibility. The emphasis here is to raise the innate traits of the
trainees to desired levels. They should be moulded to be highly
motivated, knowledgeable, bright professionals with a flair for results.
They must be taught to operate without plangent attention and get
maximum mileage from minimum basic action. Such a training needs a
carefully drawn-up training programme with creative inputs. In sensitive
jobs like internal security, grooming manpower including recruitment and
training is more vital than the job itself.
Indian security plans lay stress on covering targets with armed men and
preventing people from approaching the threatened target. In absence of
adequate penetration into the source of threat, none of these tactics
can have any impact on the capabilities of a terrorist to strike his
target. A human wall around the target is an infructuous show of
strength in an age where there are powerful weapons and ammunitions that
can penetrate several such layers in a single stroke. Even the best of
the snipers protecting a target would be at a disadvantage in feeling a
terrorist-to-strike who has all the advantages of time, place, surprise
and the mental and physical reflexes to superate both his target and
armed protectors. A well-planned terrorist attack fully prepares for all
these odd contretemps.
Another important strategy of the Indian security machinery is screening

people before permitting proximity to the threatened target. A
resourceful terrorist plan can facilely circumvent this with money
connections and influence. There are infinite ingenious ways available
to a resourceful and imaginative man, determined to reach his target in
circumstances where a police force remiss and ineffectual at best and
corrupt at the worst is in charge of screening as spotters, his job is
facile and custom-made for his aptitude.
The Indian police system lays emphasis on dashing qualities rather than
on mental qualities and planning that form the elan vital of security
policing. The age-old police traits like a criant show of force and a
strict adherence to hierarchical order have a mis-alliance with the
needs of security operations where patience, perseverance, calculating
mind and imagination was to foresee developments, speedy physical and
mental reflexes, unbreachable sang-froid in adverse situations, high
commitment to the work in hand, initiative and above all, courage to
take responsibility for action decide the success or otherwise of the
security build-up. Indeed, these human qualities have to be reinforced
with neoteric security equipment including latest communication,
transport, information, weaponry and other security –oriented systems.
The organisation must have three full-fledged wings in charge of (a)
collection of intelligence; (b) process and assessment of security
risks; and (c) field operation.
Collection of vital intelligence forms the pith of perficient security

operation. An effective security build-up perforce stands on the
foundation of strategic intelligence. The ferocity of security basically
depends on the quality of intelligence as an input. A security
organisation of neoteric age cannot survive without an effective
intelligence wing as a backup unit. And key intelligence does not come
freely. It has to be extracted at great risks from closely guarded
sources by resourceful intelligence operators. Often, such an operation
may require years of patient preparation by an undercover to cultivate
dependable insiders to the cause. These operations are potential
comminations to the mutual relation and ergo intelligence operators are
left to their own fate by employers when the operators are caught.
Intelligence is a venal commodity and its price can be fixed in monetary
terms. Collection of intelligence involves huge expenditure to maintain
organisation and communication reticulation, support the logistics of
the operations and at times to affect outright purchases as well. It
requires a huge army of highly-paid and expensive operators and agents
to cover places and groups that are potentially security risks. The
success of security back home tout a fait depends upon the quality of
the intelligence sent back. In an age of bitter concourse to win over or
withhold a piece of intelligence, double crosses or even triple crosses
are au naturel. The situation necessitates keeping an ey on these
operators from a distance.
The raw inputs from intelligence sources have to be winnowed, classified

and processed if found to have security relevance. Intelligence
collection sans processing is as good as, if not worse than, not
collecting them at all. Raw intelligence throws the national security to
the winds by raising a maelstrom, wherein facts and fancies are
completed beyond recognition. It blunts the sensitivities of the sleuths
and excoriates targets to real danger. The possibility can be avoided by
creating a nerve-centre, a command post in the security organisation to
process and assess intelligence inputs anent ground realities, past
history and known facts. This organisation must be manned by people au
fait and capable of reading between lines to arrive at right conclusions
as well as invenit strategies in the interests of the internal security.
This body must have a flair for research and analysis and knowledge of
the internal situation of the country, dynamics of various factors that
have bearing on the internal security and possess an insight into minor
developments that may blow up into serious security risks at some future
date. It must be constituted of carefully chosen professionals with
proven records of eximious work and a deep sense of patriotism and
commitment to their work and should be directly responsible to the chief
of the organisation and work as a high-power advisory body in all
matters pertaining to the security.
Field operation is the cutting –edge of the security build-up. Other

activities in the organisation are just postern backups to the field
operation that forms the mainstay of the security organisation and
inclips a vast portion of the organisation’s manpower, equipments,
machinery, money, time and other resources. If intelligence operators
must have alert eyes and ears, security analysts must have smart mental
faculties and field-operators must have smart reflexes inter alia. Only
people with exceptional courage and perseverance and dare devilry can
behove to this job. Resourceful people with energy and willingness to
work hard in tramontane circumstances, rare single-mindedness of purpose
and devotion can alone be successful in the dangerous world of field
operations. They have to be pollent-willed people with the precinct to
risk their lives for the sake of achieving goal. Screening people for
these traits is not a facile job. This arduous job has to be performed
with great care and caution for the quality of internal security of the
land depends upon the work turned out by them. The people who are chosen
for the job must be able to provide security to men, places and
structures, known to be sensitive and comminuted by enemies, while
themselves remain in shades. Speed and surprise are their chief
attributes. Resourcefulness to do jobs which appear impossible is their
mainstay. Indeed, the demands are too high and this necessitates careful
selection and recruitment, efficient training, high motivation and
liberal compensation in the form of generous pay, perks and expenditure
accounts. The people who play with their lives to meet the objectives of
the internal security have to be treated well for the risks to which
they willingly submit themselves in the interests of the country and its
internal security.
All internal security operations must be part of a raisonne security

plan that is drawn out in advance after through research and study of
the best available intelligence on internal and external affairs, the
geographical position of the country, the internal and external economic
situation, likely shifts in foreign relations, objects and intentions of
neighbouring countries, the dynamics of ethnic, communal and linguistic
interaction within the country and scientific advances in weaponry and
other gadgetry, having a bearing on the security matters. The security
plan must foresee likely sources of trouble inside and outside the
country and cultivate undercover operators at sensitive spots either by
its own resources or through agents, often years or decades in advance
to keep an eye on developments, feed intelligence and control situations
by infiltration to strategic positions. Without this groundwork, no
security operation can make much headway.
Any security build-up must stand on two basic requirements; firstly,

up-to-date knowledge of the security risks and their starategies and
secondly, a security machinery devised to meet specific demands of the
specific circumstances. A thorough knowledge of the adversaries includes
an in-depth knowledge of their long and short term objectives, their
time-to-time aberrations, strategies, expertise, modes of operation,
friends, enemies, sources of support, likely change of strategies and
their analyses to assess the possibility of security threats and likely
targets. Yes, it is a stupendous task involving huge manpower and other
resources a grands frais. Yet, it is worth the cost and trouble in the
interests of the national security and a far more intelligent and
meaningful use of human and material resources than spending them to
criminals after they accomplish their pernicious job. Investigation of
terrorism-oriented crimes serves practically no purpose and makes no
impact on the plan and strategies of a well-planned terrorist outfit.
A security build-up is infrangible only if it is specific for each

circumstance depending upon the needs as assessed by security experts
from time to time. Security must essentially be an esoteric operation
with open eyes and ears and closed mouth; with open mind and closed
heart . It must be a shadowy operation rather than a gust of light
blinding people around. Intelligent terrorist operators prefer to strike
in this gust of light which is what security tends to be. A good and
pollent security plan should not have an open set-plan which by all
likelihood would be used by intelligent terrorists to their advantage.
The pollicitation of a good security plan depends upon its
secretiveness, perspicacity and ability to take even a well-prepared and
resourceful terrorist operator by surprise.
TOWARDS SANE SERVICE

Civil Service being the trunk of the tree of democratic
Governance, Praveen Kumar wants it to be safeguarded
From the axe of job reservation policy.
It is a historical fact that India which is characterised by its unity

in diversity was never a single nation at any time in its long course of
history of several millenniums, till the feat was achieved in the 20th
century.
Neither Asoka Mourya or Samudra Gupta or Chandra Gupta nor Akbar or

Aurangzeb of Mughul dynasty in Indian history can boast of binding all
the regions stretching between Cape Camorin and Karakorampass, and Rann
of Kutch and Arunachal Pradesh under a single rule to give meaning to
the concept of a single nation.
No military strength, no religion, no cultural similarities, no unity of

civilisation, no linguistic resemblances nor geographical proximities at
any time before succeeded in forging a single nation out of the vast
land masses south of the Himalayas.
If India is a single nation today, though in its rather moth-eaten form,

the credit should go to its distinguished civil service of early and
middle 20th century vintage which was rightly called as the steel-frame
of Indian unity.
Should India continue as a single nation, it has to be through the grit,
strength and quality of its civil service alone.
Any tampering with the quality of the civil service and doing anything
that may mangle the ‘steel-frame’ grade of Indian civil service
certainly go fatal to the very existence of India as a single nation.
The worst curse on India and its people is the classification and
stratification of humanity on the basis of births and adoption of rigid
codes of social conduct to rule the relationship between those in
different strata.
The lower strata being condemned to be treated less than street dogs and
denied equality and any opportunity of growth and decent life.
This curse for several millenniums permanently handicapped certain

accurst social groups from breaking away from primitive way of life.
This cancer in Indian social life develops a major moral responsibility

on India not only to get rid of the nasty disease, but also to
rehabilitate the victims of the age-old social bevue.
Post-independent India, as welfare state, took innumerable measures,

both constitutional and legislative, towards absterging the sins
perpetrated by its past practices of ages on the unfortunate sections of
the society.
The removal of untouchability, prevention of atrocities, reservations,

in jobs and educational opportunities to quote but a few.
Sine dubio, such special treatments alone can somewhat remedy the
inhuman treatment and delour meted out to some without an iota of
fellow-feeling and kindness for generations after generations.
Such measures on special footing are not only compensations India must
pay for having deprived some of its children of their growth
opportunities for so long, though belated and inadequate as they are.
They are also a kind of remorse the country suffers for its past sins.
But the cardinal question is the direction such measures must take.
Wrong policies in such matters may not only fail to make the measures
efficacious, but may also block the existing opportunities too.
It may also further weaken the social fabric of the country and ipso
facto pose real threat to the very existence of India as a country.
The apollyon in question is the policy of job reservation in civil

service which may eat up the quality and steel-frame toughness of the
setup to disintegrate and balkanise India sans its only binding force
namely a sound civil service to keep the country united in its
diversities.
The victims of the age-old stratified class system actually deserve many
more special privileges than delivered to them at present.
The necessarily need easier access to educational opportunities to

prepare them for higher slots in life.
Hence, the need of reservations in educational institutions.
Perhaps, institution of an apex development bank with branches in all

districts or taluks of the country, exclusively for their financial
needs of nonconsumptive nature at nominal rate of interest a la rural or
agricultural banks may prove a significant step in this direction.
Institution of liberal scholarships, concession in or exemption from,

application fee for jobs, wider network or board and lodging facilities
for students, free higher studies, special vocational training for men
and women, concessional hostel facilities for working men and women,
easy housing schemes, free advanced medical treatment facilities, etc
are other welfare schemes for the unprivileged classes that may help to
bring them on par with others.
This will wipe out the achilles’ heel from the face of Indian social
structure to make Indian society civilised without affecting the quality
of its governance and parameters of survival.
It was Winston Churchill who said democracy is the worst type of

governance except for all other types of governance. Basically,
democracy signifies rule of common man and rule of mediocrity and ergo,
more dangerously the rule of hoi polloi or mob.
This definition applies principally to the political system of the

democratic governance and not to the civil service system which is
expected to be the subtle spine of the democratic rule. A sound civil
service as amicus curiae draws the metes and bounds of governance within
which the democratic system must function and also inspire a sense of
moderation, discipline, fairness, legality and reasonableness in the
political leadership of the system.
It absorbs the jerks and shocks of the political follies and helps the
political leadership in taking sound and intelligent decisions at right
times.
In this sense, a sound civil service structure is sine qua non for
running a democracy and the strength of the democracy depends entirely
on its soundness and quality. A democracy without sound civil service
slumps like a mass of flesh without a spine to support it.
The well being of the repressed class of India depends solely upon the
survival of India as a single nation and therefore on the quality and
soundness of the civil service.
If there is anything scanty in the present world, it is high quality and

excellence. They are such a rare commodity that even slight distractions
in the swink to cultivate them end up in their disappearing in thin air.
Excellence has a distinct tendency of light from mediocrity and
regrouping otherwise at its own level. This tendency renders maintenance
of the tempo of high quality and excellence a difficult task. Any
allowance to mediocrity leads to a sustained flight of quality and
excellence till mediocrity completely takes over. This is what is feared
about present Indian civil service thanks to reservation policy.
The fear that the steel-frame civil service of the pre-independent India
vintage have crumbled into a mediocre setup now by wrong policies of
selection and recruitment in independent India needs serious attention
it deserves.
Several opinion polls point to the diminishing attraction of the civil

service to crème de la crème of the Indian youth in preference to
foreign and private industrial houses and banks as job opportunities.
This trend deserves deeper concern than at present in those who are
interested in the survival of India as a nation and democracy. The
interest of the country lies in marshalling the best talents of the
country in service of maintaining the country as a nation and democracy
and that need must get the first priority over all other issues
including developmental and welfare vintage. Unfortunately, it is not
happening in India now.
Civil Service is the trunk of the tree of democratic governance and

breaking the trunk itself is self-defeating for all national goals
including justice for all. By the policy of job reservation to civil
service, India is venturing to the folly of cutting its own s trunk.
Stracient damage has already been done by this in the last five decades.
No distraction like reservation of any kind must deter the criterion of
genuine merit and competence in civil service.
Real merit and competence emerge from exemplary unity of diverse human
faculties like sound character, strong intellect right attitude,
commitment and devotion to work. Doing anything to subvert these virtues
in civil service in tantamount to wrecking the interests of the country.
It is not that somebody wants to subvert the interests of the country by

hoisting job reservation policy on civil service. The intentions of
reservation is beyond reproach . The fault lies in its pursuance.
Reservation of any kind in civil service clearly proves to be wrong

means to reach the right end. How early India realises this fact, so
fast is served India’s best interests.
NEED TO REVITALISE THE POLICE

The stereotyped style of functioning irrespective of merit, suitability
to a given situation and options available makes the police functioning
largely mechanical and stripped of any intellectual or creative contents
in it, says Praveen Kumar
In a disciplined organisation like the police where subordination and

role play forma crucial psychological necessity, rigid inheritance of
the style of functioning has become sine qua non in the vacuum of
independent and creative thinking. This is the seed of the frigidity of
the Indian Police set up. More dangerously, blind faith in the inherited
style of functioning as the only way out to the exclusion of all other
open alleys deprive the Indian police of the richness of variety and
growth opportunities while cementing ranks and bringing a sense of unity
and belongingness that create a sense of strength about the organisation
in outsiders. The stereotype style of functioning irrespective of merit,
suitability to a given situation and options available makes the police
functioning largely mechanical and stripped of any intellectual or
creative contents in it. Any deviation from the beaten-path is
considered with contempt and suspicion and birds of the same flock come
together to bring the prevaricator to the required path. Until then, he
is labeled and condemned as pout of the mainstream. That is why an
imaginative and creative soul newly entering the Indian Police feels
absolutely stifled and either follows the flock at the cost of his
convictions or just withers away fighting a loosing and humiliating
battle outside the mediocre mainstream. Winning such a battle to effect
a couple of changes in the mental makeup of the giant organisation is an
extremely rare phenomenon and not worth to an individual to have that
try.
These features bring distinct characteristics to the organisation.

Indeed, the police have people come from all walks of life with their
distinct personal features and styles. But , once they enter the police
organisation, the grind of the system takes its toll and creates a
common profile in its members. Though such a grind is common in many
other organisations also, it is not as complete and clear as in the
police. The process is not consciously man-made and ergo incidental to
the policing system. The standardisation so brought by the process has
its own advantages and disadvantages. In case of the police, it appears
that disadvantages as the standardised style of functioning cut through
the growth process of the organisation in efficiency and excellence. It
also grievously destablises dignity of the service and stifles
professional values. There is inveterate servilitude in the style of
functioning evolved in the police by this prices. This often exposes the
police to gratuitous risks in performance of legitimate duties.
POLITICIAN- POLICE NEXUS

Adaptations to political masters as a bargain to secure key posts prove
fatal to the dignity as well as professional values of the police set
up. A Police officer of a state in southern India succeeded in cornering
the coveted post of police commissioner at the State capital a few years
back with the support of a politician known in the then political
parlance as the ‘ Father, Mother’ of the state Chief Minister. A few
days later, the politician in an inebriated state was arrested with his
associates while fleeing in a car late night after being involved in a
sex scandal involving a budding film star. The police official who
affected the arrest recognised the identity of the person he had
arrested only after they were brought to the nearby police station in
the city. The Police Commissioner was intimated about the developments.
The Police Commissioner promptly made his appearance in the police
station in the night and ensured the immediate release of his political
godfather. But, the political heavy weight in a temulent state was
impeccable. He caught the collar of the Police Commissioner in front of
the shocked subordinate officials and shouted at the Police Commissioner
in his inebriated voice asking him whether he was made the Police
Commissioner to arrest and bring him to the Police station. The police
Commissioner was seen meekly begging the politician to pardon him. The
incident made headlines in news papers. The Police Commissioner later
rose to become the Police Chief of the state and is now retired. Such
incidents abound in circumstances of Police officers vying for coveted
posts a tout prix and as a consequence, the dignity of the posts lowers
and the professional qualities of the organisation suffer.
An important reason at the derriere of this failing of the police lies

in their general inability at assessments. A rather queer characteristic
of the police is its dithering as far as assessments in any form are
concerned. It is an organisational failing in the police and the police
have found an easy way out of this failing –falling in line with the
general trend and precedence sans application of mind. An officer once
wrongly rapped as difficult to work with, would be seen so forever by
all so much that he himself would begin to trust it as true.
Though this trend strengthens the sinew of collectivity and collective

responsibilities for whatever purposes in the organistion, it
considerable weakens the intellectual credibilities of the police and
tears to pieces the fabric of objectivity and fairness in the
organisation.
Once in service, independent thinking becomes a disaster and metabasis

as a mechanical part of the flock becomes a crude habit. While this
tendency in the organisation brings the elements of collective
acceptance within the danger of a person or situation or event once
wrongly interpreted, never again to be seen in right perspective,
destroys its strength and credibility. This lessens the possibility of
seeing things at anytime rightly thereafter. The result often is
perverted assessments. In the police, where assessments of men and
events form a crucial role, this failure proves fatal to the
organisation as well as to the society. This fomented with generally low
intellectual qualities of the police, confines the police to mediocrity
and restrains it from rising to excellence in performances and promoting
high calibre in its personnel.
SENSE OF COLLECTIVITY
There is a sense of collectivity for good or bad in the police. None in
the police normally get a spark to see a thing from a new angle and give
their own interpretations or judgement ectogenesis to the view already
held. The sense of rectitude becomes secondary when the sense of
collectivity is at stake. Though the police profession demands fairness,
justice and rectitude as its primary concern, passion for the values in
the police is surprisingly feeble. The commitment to do things legally
and rightly is superficial.
A fall-out of corruption in the police is build-up of a dynamics which

promotes the interests of corrupt in the system at the cost of those who
retained the pristine value of professionalism. The flexible elements
who can be manoeuvred to required moulds through the juste milieu of
pelf and position are useful assets to people in key positions to save
the interests of their kith and kin as and when they get involved in
criminal proceedings. Such characters in the force are always cultivated
and posted to key positions so that striking compromises, when situation
warrants, becomes easy. This strategy ends up in honest police officers
being sidelined and promotes corruption. The dynamics which helps
influential individuals to evade the long arm of law, harms the
interests of the country, its police and the rule of law. Police
officers of plastic conscience are preferred to upright professionals to
key posts even in national level police agencies like the Central Bureau
of Investigation and the Intelligence Bureau. Police officers known for
professional approach are spurned and distanced as inconvenient
elements. In the situation, competence plays no role in preferences
while honesty, integrity and professional commitment play negative
roles. A history of bending backward on professional considerations
always becomes a qualification in obtaining preferences to more
sensitive jobs in important police organisations.
A case of dowry death reported against a retired judge and his family in
February 1992 in a state as referred to the state investigation agency.
The investigation made out a case for charge-sheet against the retired
judge and five others including his wife, son, two daughters and another
person. The chief of the investigating agency in the rank of IGP being
close to the retired judge, dragged his feet from further proceedings in
the case. The Superintendent of Police who was supervising the
investigation of the case wanted to take the investigation to its
logical end. But arrests in the case were prevented and the charge-sheet
was unduly delayed. The insistence of the Superintendent of Police to
charge-sheet the case cost him his post and he was transferred in July
1992 to the Home Guards department of the state as the head of it
training wing. The case remained frozen sans charge-sheet for more than
one and a half years, till the IGP’s transfer in 1993. The case was
later charge-sheeted in March 1994 with the retired judge and his two
daughters being dropped from the charge-sheet on the basis of evidences
tampered at later stages. The police officer who tried to stall the
wheel of the legal process subsequently succeeded in gaining entry to a
sensitive police organisation at the national level and later in his own
state.
An extension of this style of functioning is their complete absorption

in their service to the exclusion of other dimensions of life including
family life. Nothing interests them outside the police except specific
popular entertainments to counterpoise the tension of the quotidian
police work. The result is the family life of most police officers being
disoriented and their children more then often betraying criminal
tendencies because of the lack of paternal care and attention. The lack
of attention to personal habits manifests in very few police officers
leading a happy and normal retired life.
It is in the interests of the police to come out of this pernicious

grind of the style of functioning, to breach the accretion and break out
to the fraicheur of the invigorating open world of endless
possibilities. But the adnate growth over the police system is so thick
that no trickles of fresh air survive through it. Anything ab intra
cannot ruffle the complacency of the constricting system. This is
general experience and concomitant conviction, that something
cataclysmic from outside should shake the system and bring it to its
senses to show it how and why it is wrong and what retards the growth of
the police to its full bloom to efficiency and excellence and how
returning the style of functioning can flush new life to the Indian
police. We can only hope that such a development comes soon and saves
the Indian police from further degradation.
ROLE OF POLICE IN THE RECONSTRUCTION OF INDIA
The police is the watchdog in a democracy. It forms the axle that keeps
the vital engine of the administration running. It is modelled on the
British system except for a few changes made in response to the
situation regarding crime, security and law and order. That is not to
say that the Indian police is alien to the Indian situation. The utility
of the Indian police to India depends on the direction and degree to
which they have taken to this process of adaptation and also how
successfully and efficiently.
The responsibility of the police as an organisation is three fold in

enforcing the rule of law; assisting the judiciary in the dispensation
of justice and keeping an ey on the internal security of the country.
The three responsibilities do widely vary in their scope and functional
requirements. The police may sometimes be called upon to break laws,
though surreptitiously, in order to protect the security of the country.
Or, while they function only as a fact finding machine to help the
judiciary enforce the rule of law, they may be asked to enforce laws as
enforcers of law and order.In spite of these variations, what gives the
police a holistic dimension is their importance as the spine of the rule
of law. They are the watchdog of the administration. The police are one
of the most important levers required in running the machinery of
statecraft. That explains the impatient race among rulers to control
this vital lever.
ASPECTS FORGOTTON
The very nature of the functions of the police demands that it be

insulated from the vagaries of the short-time rules of a democratic
setup. Their responsibilities as enforcers of law warrant their
allegiance exclusively to the rules and laws of the country; they are
beholden to the judiciary as the investigating authority while their
part as watchdogs of the country’s internal security raises them above
political and leadership bickerings. Often, these aspects of the police
are happily forgotten in India.
The reasons lie in the rulers as well as in the police. In the rulers
because it is natural for anyone to take advantage of the tools that
make themselves available for use and it is rather naïve to expect the
rulers to ignore it while the police willingly offer themselves to be at
their disposal. The rulers of democratic India do use the police for
their personal and party ends to the extent that the nearly half a
century after Independence has obfuscated the distinction between
national interests and personal interests of the rulers in the use of
policemen.
RESPONSIBILITIES IGNORED
The reasons lie in police because the police of democratic India chose
to brush aside their professional and national responsibilities and
instead preferred to be the handmaid of those in power . Two factors
helped the process. One was the wrong type of people at the helm of the
organisation as models. Another was the lack of understanding of the
concepts of obedience and discipline. The nonprofessional approach of
the police leadership percolated down and sadly was accepted as the
general rule by the rank and file.
The entire force has forgotten that its primary obedience is to the laws
of the country and that the rulers and mere representatives of the laws.
The police have forgotten the cardinal principle that their profession
dictates them to do their duty even if it may be against the rulers if
the law finds the latter doing wrong. Serious professional lapses have
not only weakened the Indian police, but damaged the political system,
social values and the credibility of the democratic process. Ignorance
and indifference on the part of the public in general, and the
intellectual class in the police system, have ended up with the police
acquiring a free hand to function without restraint and guidance.
The country, indeed has a sturdy police framework in terms of

organisational strength and budgetary provisions. Only, the fabric is in
poor shape. That money is liberally made available to the police
indicates political patronage. In other words, the rulers have
recognised the important role played by the police in running the
administration. This leads to a close link between politicians and the
police. This is where crime enters the picture. The link is too
deeprooted to be easily severed.
The police have two weak areas- the nonprofessional approach and
arbitrary management. Both are interlined and contribute to each other’s
existence. The nonprofessional approach has eroded professional
commitment and encouraged corruption. Professional pride has been pushed
into oblivion. Personal interests have gained precedence over
organisational interests. The breaches have helped opportunists to
intervene and dictate terms to the police. Matters beyond the realm of
the police have gained in importance at the cost of the organisation’s
credibility.
The system has undergone a lopsided growth with random spurts of control
and workload, unfair selection and recruitment procedures, neglected
training, inaccuracies in the assessment of work and people, irregular
promotions and transfers, unplanned modernisation programmes and funny
service rules. Efficient management has been relegated to the background
with the whole set up inclined towards a rigid hierarchical order. This
trend has told upon the professional qualities of the police causing
decline in its organisational efficiency.
BRITISH CHARACTERISTICS
India, on the threshold of independence, saw both the positive and

negative sides of the British administration. Among the positive
attributes was the creation of a sound police system. Other aspects were
a sound professional approach, objectivity and toughness in police work,
a feeling of pride among the policemen, a sense of commitment and fair
play in discharging the work in hand, high morale and respect for a
healthy value system.
The most glaring among the negative qualities are its disinclination to
democratic values, failure to identify with the Indian ethos and failure
to appreciate the common man’s aspirations and predicament. An
independent India has added to the negative aspects. One of them is
corruption. Also, the passage of time has set in motion a process of
continuous reconstruction.
The police of the British rule has as its prime objective the interests
and upkeep of the British Raj in India. In democratic India, in the
absence of capable leadership, the system has failed to reset its
priorities and formulate its objective. It seems to have failed to
comprehend where its loyalty should lie. The fall of the British Raj,
may be, left a void and they found refuge in the political leadership.
On the one hand, the policemen were unable to think clearly, and on the
other, some officers in higher ranks wanted to be close to and in the
good books of key political figures to promote their interests. As a
result, the system gradually lost touch with its professional objective
of being loyal to the Indian Constitution, an objective of establishing
the rule of the law in the country Power went into the hands of
dishonest and criminal elements.
EMERGENCY TREND
The police acted as the handmaid of the political leadership during the
Emergency in 1976, save for a few dignified people. Both the Central
Bureau of Investigation and the Intelligence Bureau were extensively
used for political ends. Then emerged the custom of providing protection
mostly to political leaders and other well-connected personages as the
expense of the public. The trend of the police being committed to
political leadership has continued.
It is an irony that the political leadership which is supposed to take

the lead in the reconstruction of India is colluding with the police,
which is supposed to be the tool of the reconstruction, and is striking
at the foundation of the strength of the country. Every year sees a new
phase and a new trend in this nasty collusion among the important
players of national reconstruction taking the country nearer to the
brink of lawlessness
During the bandh in Bangalore (1991) in connection with the Cauvery

water dispute, the police were mute spectators as the agitators indulged
in vandalism and violence. In some places, the officers were forced to
open fire in self-defense and all hell broke loose. Dealt with in a
professional way, the situation could have been brought under control
and the death of several people and destruction of property could have
been avoided, Indeed, a commission of Inquiry under Justice
N.D.Venkatesh indicted the Police Commissioner for his lapses. However,
the officer’s political masters rose to the occasion and soon he
superseded a more efficient and down-to-earth senior. It is a different
story that the State administration changed hands within a few months
and the new Chief Minister restored order by putting people in their
places. But the fact remains that the findings of the Justice.
N.D.Venkatesh Commission of Inquiry never saw the light of day.
SERVING POLITICAL MASTERS
The political leaders are wary about the law and the judicial system;
and they have to be cautious on their dependence on illegal political
funds. They need the help of the police and it is not the other way
round. There are many police officers who understand this dynamics and
play their cards shrewdly. A police officer in a southern State played
it so well that in spite of his publicly proclaimed moderate efficiency,
he not an occupied the coveted position of the Police Commissioner of an
important city as Inspector General of Police (by removing the holder of
the position within six months of the latter coming there), but also
managed to be there for many years by getting the post upgraded as and
when he was promoted as Additional Director General of Police and later
as Director General of Police at the cost of all other aspirants. On his
retirement from service, the political masters obliged him by
constituting a one-man committee for him, supposedly to examine and
advice on the reorganisation of the police setup fo the State, but
actually to provide him creature comforts at Governmetn expense.
A case of cheating, forgery, falsification of records and

misappropriation of over Rs.35 lakhs by the officials of the Karnataka
Home Guards department was unearthed in 1994 and a criminal case was
registered in the jurisdictional police station in December the same
year. As the amount involved was huge, a process was set in motion to
refer the case to the Corps of Detectives for investigation. The then
State police chief came to know that one of the accused was his
confidant when he was the Commandant-General of the Home Guards the
previous year. Suddenly, all activities regarding the criminal case were
frozen for the next six months till the police chief retired. Only in
July 1995, the case was taken up and handed over to the Corps of
Detectives.
In the absence of concern on the part of the political and executive

wings of the administration in straightening out things, the judiciary
is doing exemplary work by taking action to counter the criminal
elements. The attitude of the Supreme Court to the Jain hawala case is a
case in point. The awarding of jail sentence to senior bureaucrats and
police officers of Haryna, Karnataka Andhra Pradesh and other states in
1995 for contempt of court and creation of false evidences, and issue of
nonbailable warrants and refusal of bail to a couple of former Union
Ministers this year for allegedly sheltering mafia dons and engineering
anti-Sikh riots in New Delhi are other instances.
The scene is not as bleak as it seems to be. The wheel of change is

slowly turning. The interest taken by the Supreme Court in the nexus
between the politicians, the bureaucrats and the criminals and the Vohra
Committee report on the criminalisation of politics are found to have
their effects.
CHALLENGES OF THE POLICE SETUP

The hazard of the Indian police lies in immobility of its organisational
structure. The existing police system is utterly devoid of any
adjustment mechanism that keeps it relevant to the zeitgeist. A
time-to-time review and concomitant updating of the police organisation
becomes sine qua non in the circumstances, particularly while the
nascent democracy lounder the policing system of India remis velisque,
quite obvious of the futuristic kiaugh. A systematic study of the
policing in India with an adequate pernoctation to screen the latest
researches and findings in relevant fields of social and politicial
systems and science and technology in reorienting the public
organisation and administration is an essential parameter in the vital
exercise.
A police setup worth its salt should meet the specific needs of the
policing. The police setup must necessarily be raucle in its frame to be
capable of absorbing the shocks to which it would often be exposed.
Secondly, motive factors should be substructed in the body of the
organisation as sound motivation alone can make policing a purposeful
activity. This should be reinforced with external motive factors that
can be infused to the organisation e ra nata. Thirdly, the system should
be organised so as to generate optimism and confidence ex propriis to
excudit the magical entrainement. Another important aspect that should
weigh lourd in evolving an effective police organisation is evolving a
mechanism whereby every police officer or unit is put in charge of a
specific job matching his or its competence and aptitude. An element of
entrain should be brought to policing so that the work in hand can be
attended to with genuine involvement by each police officer. Another
strategic principle of healthy police organisation is having absolute
faith and giving full responsibilities to subordinates with a
concomitant, reward and punishment system that follows at the heels. Any
attempt to disturb the balance of faith, full responsibility and reward
and punishment system is certain to fell the organisation into
desuetude. The extant concept of collective responsibility through a
chain of command has gone passe by its propensity to demotivate the real
workers due to the corrupt ambitions of those at higher levels in the
chain of command. Policing has grown of late to be such an independent
field of specialisiation that it is impossible for a mortal being to be
proficient in even a single aspect of policing. It is rather a folly to
ween a police officer as being able to handle all aspects of policing
though at different times. Hence, the need of specialisation-oriented
policing. The present managerial world is increasingly realising the
importance of human resources as organisational inputs. Unless all-out
efforts are made to inhaust to police the crème de la crème of the
country with exceptional attributes of probity, intelligence and
commitment and impart eximious and purposeful training to bring out the
best of each, no efforts at updating the organisation can bring about a
sempiternal transformation in the setup. The fact that policing can be
successful only with popular co-operation, focuses the attention of the
police organisation on the needs of building up its image. Although
efforts are already afoot towards building up the image of the police,
the depths of the possibilities are yet to be fully explored and
exploited. A scientific approach in this score will make policing tanato
uberior. Also, the scope for scholarly and intellectual activities in
policing will make policing multi-dimensional and add to its
effectiveness. The fremit reception given to intellectual activities in
some quarters of policing may not go down too well with the future
police planners. The future police organisation and administration
should cater to the need of intellectual activities.
The present police organisation and administrative system have to be

overhauled in the near future as the ineffectivensess of the extant
system becomes increasingly obvious with the flaws in the edifice
starting to gape wider. The areas wherein restructuring may be desirable
and the thrusts sine qua non to stuff the hiatus valde deflendus to have
a featous police setup, quite capable of facing the challenges of the
future, are discussed below.
The proclivity of weighing the police with reinforcement of all types of

legislations has become a major hazard to effective policing. While the
proliferation of legislations in independent India made it impossible
even to keep track of their numbers, it is senseless to ween the police
as being able to enforce them all. The stupendous task of enforcing
these legilsations adversely affects the effectiveness of the police and
corrodes its credibility. This is emphatically so with social
legislations which pass out of our legislative houses sans cohibition.
These progressive measures are inherently controversial in nature and
their enforcement by the police weakens its credibility as an agency of
serious business and peremptory order. It is plauditory to conceive of
the police as a vehicle of progressive measures, but in the process, is
certain to put both its credibility and professionalism into jeopardy as
the social legilsatioons lack depth and gravity to enforce them and
assiduous enforcement may ricochet as an out-cry of harassment and
high-handedness. It is not in the interest of the country to expose its
police to such civil contecks and suffer it thereby.
India can have an independent social policing system under the social
welfare ministry to which police officers with a flair for progressive
measures may be deputed. The social policing system as a professional
enforcement agency of the social policing system as a professional
enforcement agency of the social welfare ministry can do an effective
job in enforcing progressive social legilsations with all their nuances,
by fully devolving on it while saving the police organisation from the
embarrassment of handling issues to which it is not equipped either
mentally, proffessionally or organisationally. This measure will exeme
the police organisation from unwarranted pressures and enhance its
legitimacy in handling serious security and law and order issues.
The growth of police functions as adnated to present life-style of

increasing complexity is enormous of late with policing slinking to the
vitals of all streaks of social and nonsocial living. Policing slinking
to the vitals of all streaks of social and nonsocial living. Policing
has become a hi-tech affair these days with scopes for further
advancements. Each major activity of policing like maintenance of order,
investigation of crimes, collection of intelligence and security
operations have assumed such an independent status of non a such
expertise and professionalism that these fields being inhered is neither
desirable nor feasible. Nor in the circumstances, does shifting a
functionary from one field of expertise to the other help his overall
performance. Anfractuosity in any one of these fields of specialisation
for life is becoming a requisite as time goes by.
The futuristic policing of India must have its subordinate police as

professionals in a given field of specialisation, say maintenance of
order crime investigation, intelligence collection or security operation
with synergy manifesting only at higher levels. So India may have
independent law and order police, detective police, special police and
security police each separately recruited and trained for
professionalism and expertise in their respective fields. Officers from
all these specialised fields should be eligible to rise to general
policing at higher levels on the basis of a pro rata quota system for
promotions.
The increased preoccupation of the police with law and order and
security issues in view of the growing cataclysmic activities in the
country has adversely affected effective crime administration of late.
Police stations have become registering stations as far as crime
administration is concerned. The time of the local police is fordone
with immediate issues of law and order and VIP security, and in the
process, crime investigation has become a casualty. The process may
further deteriorate as security and law and order problems increase in
coming years. Neither the crime staff at subordinate levels nor the
supervisory staff at district and higher levels, in the melee, have the
will or the resources to divert to crime investigation while the crime
rate in the country is assuming dangerous proportions.
Crime investigation should not be allowed to suffer because of disorder

and insecurity in the country, as otherwise, a vicious circle may
develop wherein disorder and insecurity lead to fall in investigation
and flabby investigation in turn, to patulous disorder and insecurity.
This triste development may be effectively dealt with by an independent
crime setup, parallel to the law and order outfit.
An independent crime outfit in district and state may exquisitely behove
to a futuristic police setup by giving crime investigation a boost and
insuring it against the peracute pangs of organisational maladies of the
future.
The compulsions of urban policing are strikingly different from those of

rural policing. Response time is the hallmark of urban policing where a
delay of a few minutes can make a difference between death and life as
criminals and terrorists with the most sophisticated communication, and
weapon system and hair-raising organisational accuracy overawe the
police, pitted against them in the course of their criminal operations.
The present police station-oriented policing is incomeptent to meet the
challenges of the urban criminals either in resources or in
organisational ingine. Further complacency in re own procinct may stifle
the very policing system of India.
Unity, resoursefulness and speed form the spine of urban policing. The
control room-centered policing in urban centres where men and
transportation and latest communication facilities that work round the
clock in shifts enables galvanic operations to tackle law and order
problems.
This outfit with unlimited resources at its disposal for launching any
type of operation within a few minutes of communication may suffice to
meet the challenges of maintaining law and order in urban areas in the
new age.
The chief cause of policing never being a profession in India the

ineffectiveness of its training facilities. In spite of adequate
infrastructures available for training police officials of various ranks
these centres largely fail to meet the quality required to make a
recruit a thorough professional. An overhaul of the extant training
facilities in terms of its quality, content and character is inevitable
to keep the Indian police excubant to future challenges. The training
facilities should be made centres of scholarship and research on police
subjects with professionals of national reputation in each subject
handling their respective subjects. The psychology faculty of the centre
should endeavour to build character and infuse right orientation among
the recruits. The faculty members of the training centers should be
exceptionally well paid so as to inveigle the best in the field to join.
Army officers must handle outdoor classes. This model helps in
instilling the highest standards and expectations in trainees till they
become full-fledged officers and orient them to become professional
police officers, apart from distancing them from the moderate influences
which are herded to handle police training centres in the present setup.
The trainees must be exposed to police officers as guest speakers, by
inviting very senior police officers of the highest integrity and job
standards to deliver talks on specific topics. Separate professional
training courses should be available in the training centres for law and
order police, crime police, intelligence police and security police with
scope for advanced learning with an eye to the latest developments in
each respective field. Latest training methods should be adopted with
management, computers and advanced psychology inter alia as the common
subjects of study for all the courses. The training centres should give
the impression of being temples of advanced studies apart from being so.
Policing requires commitment and dedication on the part of its

operators. The principles of faith and responsibility must run invisus
through the vitals of the policing, should it be purposeful and
successful. The extant bureaucratic malady that infested the Indian
police setup cohibits healthy policing practices. The police
organisation should be reoriented to develop a professional approach to
its operations with full faith and responsibility as the hallmark of the
delegation of power. The present emphasis on procedures should be
shifted to commitment and result-orientation within the ambit of the
rules.
An analytical study of policing, its trends and modern techniques helps

to bring professionalism in policing. Due encouragement for the study of
theoretical aspects of policing and its application in the field through
in-service training will be a welcome step in this direction. If police
managers succeed in inspiring in police officers an interest, in
theoretical aspects of the policing and its latest techniques, it would
be a kenspeckle leap in abraiding Indian police to the challenges of the
future.
Policing as a phenomenon of maintaining order and security in society

cannot afford to be oblivious of the flux in the modern lifestyles. As
an integral part of civil living, policing must prepare itself to amate
the increasing complexities of modern life by modifying its
organisational and administrative setups to the demands, these
vicissitudes create. The changes warranted in policing may either be
deciduous or peremptory depending on the nature of the transition in
society. It is left to police planners to analyse the nature of the flux
in the society and locate the areas where decession from the past
practices has become sine qua non for policing. This should be an
ongoing process if policing is to retain its relevance as the guardian
of social discipline. The futuristic challenges of policing would be pro
rata to the twists of the future living. The prospects of Indian
population reaching the mark of a billion and the concomitant luctation
of two billion needy hands to grab a share in the country’s limited
resources of food, shelter, water, clothing, electricity schooling,
employment etc., naturally make life a cut-throat concours and a
ruthless adventure devoid of scruple, human values and concern for
fellow men. It would be a fight for survival with less competent and
skeigh gentlemen going belive hors de combat. The kenspeckle pejoration
had already set in from the early sixties. Though the Indian policing
system managed somehow to deal with the vicissitudes till now, the
geometric acceleration of the flux of the coming years may prove to be
too much to the extant police setup. Therefore, it si high time now that
we prepare out police organisation and administration for the future
challenges.
POLICING THE POLICE

The work police or policing is derived from the Greek roots polis means
city and politeia, Latin politia and French police means polity; its
English root is “policy” means statecraft, plan or course of action
especially in statecraft or administering the laws. The spectrum of the
meanings of the word ‘police’ and ‘policing’ swings from ‘city’ in one
extremity to ‘statecraft’ and administering the laws in the other.
Police and policing imply administering the laws of the country in the
process of the statecraft. Police deal with laws as part of the
administration in shape of its enforcement and detection and
investigation of its violations. Policing the police is administering
laws to police and bringing violators to book selon les regles. It is a
measure of fencing the fences to prevent them from themselves looting
the crop. The vectors of policing the police rely on the moral
convictions of the police force and pro rata decide the effectiveness of
policing outside. A law-abiding police is a boon to the country, its
administration and policing system as well.
The very concept of policing the police is pregnant with the suggestion
that police do not necessarily limit themselves to the bounds of the
laws, therefore require policing. A protector, guardian and enforcer in
one has two facets: he is a master as well as a servant at the same
time. This is what is expected of police in regard to laws. The issue is
whether police serve the laws in the capacities. They do act as masters
in enforcing them. But their role as servants of laws needs deeper probe
about how far they are subject to and guided by the laws in force.
Policing the police involves self-policing. Internal vigil against

lawlessness within in the form of prevention, investigation, enforcement
and protection motivated by a sense of commitment to law and justice is
its pith. Such commitment presupposes professional pride, conditioned by
high morale spawned by clean professional culture of high values, sound
reputation and standing of the profession in society and the sense of
achievement and recognition, the profession induces. The elements of
policing the police are embedded in the organisational culture and the
managerial dynamics of the police setup. Its value system, objectives,
means pursued to achieve them, attainments, strengths and weaknesses,
the reticulation of human relationship, public image, efficiency of
managerial vectors, sense of fairness in assessing performance and
granting recognition determine the orientation of a police organisation
to rein in itself to the consuetudes within the bounds of law, justice
and popular acceptability. Their sensitivity to their image and
reputation helps to strain every fibre to keep up to public expectations
and avoid unfair practices. This is au reste the individual pride in the
force about being a worthy member of a worthy institution. The
individual and organisational prides interact to create an ambience of
high morale and great professional pride to serve as the greatest tool
of policing the police from within.
Creation of a distinct arm within the police setup to police the

organisation a la military police in army is another techinique. This is
gratuitous in police for the simple reason that police organisation is
capable of handling police responsibilities within as effectively as
outside. The only block to the process is natural fellow-feeling and
sympathies to erring colleagues. The issue can be handled through
appropriate administrative measures au reste adequate sensitisation to
the threats of unlawful and criminal activities ab intra.
Criminal and other unlawful activities of the law-enforcers destabilise
the democratic foundation as well as the judicial system of the country.
Police hors la loi while act as harbourers and pillars of support to
outside criminals and create havoc in the law–enforcing system, no
meaningful policing is possible. They boost the confidence of criminals
and help the spread of criminal activities. A true effort to arrest
lawlessness in the country must begin with pernoctation against outlaws
within the police and drastic measures to snap their connections with
outside criminals. This brings the need of policing the police to the
forefront.
Efforts at policing the police must begin with right recruitment policy
to ensure that only right people enter the job. Next important stage is
right training. Third stage is creation of right ambience of job culture
within the service. Fourth factor is institution of a right system of
rewards and punishments on the basis of actual performance. Fifth is
sensitising the top brass of the force about the need of policing the
police too make policing meaningful and purposeful. An extension of this
sensitisation is willingness of the police administrators to track down
unlawful and criminal elements within the force and efforts to
deracinate hem from the system as fast as possible. It is easier said
than done in actual practice.
Obstacles to policing the police are numerous, ranging from clever use
of loopholes in the system and laws to circumvent the arm of legal
authority to use of external pressures to extricate from impending
disciplinary proceedings. Police is a part of the world outside and
cannot exist in complete isolation from it. Their close interdependance
and symbiosis make them sine qua non for each. In the circumstances,
they mutually influence and the lawlessness and criminal tendencies of
the society outside seep into the police system to allay its resolve for
self-policing, and corrode the process. This allay reflects in
recruitment, training, job culture, system of rewards and punishments
and resolve to cleanse the system. Concomitantly police lose moral right
to policing anywhere.
Vigilance organisation does keep tab on all government organisations

including the police. The arrangement is simply inadequate to meet the
needs of policing the police for the simple reason that the scope of a
vigilance organisation is more or less limited to activities related to
corruption and that its jurisdiction is so widely spread on all
government organisations that it can hardly do any meaningful work to
cleanse the police even on the single agenda of rooting out corruption.
The pith of such a vigilance organisation being constituted of police
personnel, chances of sympathies for criminal colleagues are more than
incidental. That is why, vigilance organisation can hardly be an answer
for the problem of policing the police.
Service and conduct rules that guide the conduct and activities of
government servants are too weak an instrument to meet the needs of
policing the police. Rules therein couched in procedural hurdles and
usual governmental loopholes can scarcely be effective in providing the
vigorous drive needed for the efforts of policing the police. It is a
fact that these rules achieve no more than keeping the government
business going. They are not meant either to inculcate true fear or
induce motivation towards any end. Police cannot look to them for
sustenance of its need of policing the police.
An outside agency that can substitute for the lack of self-regulation in

police is judiciary. Both are closely-knit in the cause of the
administration of law and justice. Police organisation is functionally
subject and subordinate to the directions of the judiciary in the
dispensation of justice and the rule of law. The ethos of judiciary
prevents it from close and day to day scrutiny of the police functions
unless it resorts itself to pro-active mode in select cases when
warranted by the atrophy set in as in extant India. Judiciary is a
disinterested and uninvolved observer of the field trends unless it is
forced to interfere in the overall interests of justice. Its ethos
prevent it from being an effective tool of policing the police save in
rare and far-between circumstances like the recent ones wherein handling
of investigations of politically sensitive cases came to public scrutiny
and popular condemnation. Further, judiciary lacks the infra-structure
required to perficiently police the police. Judiciary is best suited to
give jolts once in a way on selective basis. This is just about to
remind police about what is right and what is expected of them rather
than effectively policing the police.
Bihar is a distinct example of how police, putrid at the core, add to

the atrophy of the public life rather than bringing a sense of
discipline there. Police organisation is not only ineffective there; it
foots the bill of being a setup of criminals in uniform. The claim of
justice Mulla of the Allahabad High Court in 1968 that if there was an
organised force of criminals in India, it went by the name of police,
perfectly suits the police setup of some major states of North India
like Bihar and U.P. Though Punjab police did commendable job in
containing terrorism in Punjab the police in the job there at the time
were almost sans self-policing. The point is that the same goal could be
achieved with better self-policing in part of the Punjab police. Nexus
of criminals and police in Bihar is too striking to be ignored. The
police of U.P do not lag behind much. The misease is a common phenomenon
in India. Politicians hold criminals and police together from above for
obvious reasons. In the circumstances, policing the police from below
becomes meaningless and purposeless even in the unlikely even of efforts
of self-policing within the police. The true clavis of policing the
police lies in breaking the noxious nexus.
Policing must begin from within and spread outward. Self-policing is the
primus of the responsibilities of any effective policing setup. It needs
higher commitment and resolve as a foundation to meaningful policing
otherwhere. Self-policing must constitute the core of activities of a
police organisation worth the name. As only a flame within can shed
light outside and only a conviction within can spread confidence
outside, a clean environment inside only gives strength to cleanse the
world around. The conundrum is how to bring it about. Power corrupts;
absolute power corrupts absolutely. Police as the arm of the state power
structure, enjoy enormous powers. Incidence of corruption is natural in
the circumstances. Corruption of police badly affects the hoi polloi and
their trust in police, judicial system and honesty of the government. A
corrupt and lawless police makes lives of plebeian a hell. Policing by a
lawless and corrupt police is just a mockery played on hapless people.
A cardinal measure in policing the police is making the unlimited power

of police accountable. The present provision of protection given for
acts done under the colour of office is largely misused. No proper
mechanism is evolved to demarcate what to what degree constitute acts
done under the colour of office. Anything done in performance of
official duties including unlawful acts and often those done outside the
ambit of official duties too are carried piggyback under the clause of
official protection unless the acts draw the public scrutiny and become
too hot to be defended by the birds of the same flock in uniform and
their godfathers above in government. Police being a closely knit
organisation, its members rarely let down each other as any of them may
find himself in a similar situation at any time in the prevailing
prolate disregard for law in police . Also, the usefulness of police
render them protected for their misdeeds by the bureaucracy and the
politicians. The outcome is a police force with unlimited powers and
protection against its misuse without any purposeful accountability. No
organisation with such powers, protection and lack of accountability can
develop any respect for law. The foremost need is forcing police out of
this protection to bring it en plein jour to accountability for every
evil committed by it. Protection have to be an exception rather than a
rule for actions done in honest discharge of official duties. A suitable
machinery manned by disinterested persons of high standing can be
instituted to oversee the benefit of official protection is justifiable.
Leaving the matter to official superiors from the same flock may only
serve the travesty of justice.
An important safeguard to strengthen the process of policing the police

is insulation of disciplinary and rewards system from outside
influences. A sense of exactitude and promptitude has to be injected to
the system and objectively is made the abracadabra of the process. A
sense of certitude about penal action for a given failure has to develop
in the organisation. Punishment has to be pro rata to the gravity of the
mens rea and adequate to deflect others in the organisation from
pursuing the path in future . More important, nothing from outiside
should deter the process, so that the feeling of security that one can
save himself from whatever irresponsible and unlawful act by bringing
pressure from outside remains no more available to schemers and
worng-doers.
There are informal measures too, like transfers and selections of police
personnel for medals and other rewards. Presently these measures are
careened towards money and political clout one enjoys which is earned
always by corrupt, immoral and illegal means. Once weightage is given to
right people in the organisation in posting to rewarding jobs and
selection for medals and other rewards instead of those with illgotten
money and political clout, the measure itself works as an enormous boost
to the morale of the police force and brings its members on right and
lawful tracks. The first step here is bringing an end to the present
policy in favour of money and political powers. This step itself helps
police force enormously in weakening the prise of money and political
clout on the police force. The positive step of encouraging right
personnel by proper transfer and rewards policy adds to the benefit.
These subtle measures can do wonders to the efforts of policing the
police.
Intelligent employment of conventional stick and carrot method can

certainly cleanse the police setup and make policing purposive,
meaningful and effective. What is required is willingness to police the
police to make the organisation condign of policing responsibilities.
The power of police does not lie in its numerical strength or the arms
it weilds. The real power of police is its moral strength and the image
it presents to the outside world. A clean, honest and professional
police have galvanic effect on the public as well as law-breakers. They
are feared, loved, respected and patronised by everybody. This is an
environment, most conducive for perficient policing. Clean and
professional police help the cause. A clean and professional police is
possible only with an effective tool of policing the police. The major
task in reforming and building a new police force to India is
restructuring it with an inbuilt mechanism of effective self-policing.
How fast it is done, so much easier for the country to build a healthier
nation by the time India will celebrate the centenary of its
independence.
MAN MANAGEMENT IN POLICE

Man management is the point d’ appui around which all organisations
revolve. Among man, material, machine and money, it is man with his
skill and creative ingine, with his wisdom and capacity for ceaseless
labour, with his thinking faculty and intelligence, manifests in
excelsis in any organisation structure as its real spine. The strength,
vitality, quality and real test of any organisation depend upon its
human stuff and the process of its man management. For, man in an
organisation stands for totality of his motivation to the organisational
objectives and totality of motivation a toute force depends upon the
grade of man management in the organisation. Ergo, man management is the
fulcrum of any organisation’s process of survival. This is more so in a
police organisation where policing a fond is a human resources
orientated profession with boundless need of motivation for successful
operation and therefore substructured tout a fait on the merits of man
management. A police organisation sans right man management policy is
bound to crumble in a welter of discontentment and demotivation. Salient
parameters of a sound man management policy in police organisation
though vary e re nata, more prominent of them can be discussed to lay
the matter in right perspective.
HIGH MORALE
The present Indian environment of ruthless competitions impleached with

the degringolade of values made human resources management a farce in
India. The Wherewithal of human resources management like recruitment,
promotions, transfers, rewards, punishment etc, is no more employed for
the maximum benefit of the organisation. Self- interests have undermined
quality and character and organisational interests are subordinated to
personal behoofs. Though this proclivity is prevalent in all fields in
India of late, its adverse effects are kenspeckle in police organisation
as the line-system of the organisation makes the ingenuity of human
resources management, a factor having direct bearing on the quality of
the policing. While is becoming a dynamic part of the governance in
urban areas, with the rise of urban pockets, the damage done by
egregious management of human resources in the police cannot be
exaggerated. The declension may go patulous with the passage of time if
frack measures to arrest the depravation in human resources management
are ignored.
Diligent efforts at the highest level in the organisation to create a

force characterised by integrity, commitment and intelligence may be the
foremost need of a police organisation of the coming age. The prevalency
of police administration over the general administration in the survival
of a nation as a democratic and orderly country may necessitate future
changes in recruitment and service condition rules to attract the very
best talents of the country to the police organisation with
extraordinary care to ensure that anything less than the best with clean
antecedents does not step into the organisation.
WARMING-UP PROCESS
The period of initiation is the most important and impressionable period
in the career-life of fresh recruits to the police department. The
process of warming-up is based on the psychological needs of human
nature. New entrants must be handled with utmost care to give them
confidence and a feeling of belonging at the incipient stage itself. A
sense of confidence and belonging to the organisation and an ingenerate
love and respect for the higher –ups are the substruction on which
discipline grows. Efforts to inculcate disicipline in a void a like
waiting for rain from the autumn sky. Indian police impresarios failed
to understand such finer nuances of administration when they copied the
system of the British Indian police. And so we now have a police system
where discipline is insisted on subordinates sans the conditions
requisite for the discipline. The recruits who enter the fold with open
sensibilities and high expectations, wither after braving for a while
the brusque and insensitive conduct of their higher ranks. These
recruits continue thereafter to be constant enemies of the higher ranks
and the department for which they must continue to work for the next
three to four decades. A police department constituted of such members,
thanks to the shabby approach of the insensitive higher ranks in this
most impressioanble period of the former’s carrier-life, cannot turn out
eximious work. It is a tragedy that India neither spawned a police force
of its ain superior values nor copied the police force of the British
vintage in its entirety with its finer points, but cultivated instead a
burlesque of the rough and mediocre aspects of both.
WORK PRESSURE
All creations in their fraicheur and the nature’s bounty are kind and
tender and elegant. The strains of the environment cause inquietude in
nature’s balance and leads to the obfuscation of a few precious sheens
from its innards. It manifests in loss of human factors in man and his
mental space turns intenible of human qualities by environmental strains
such as work-pressures.
The Indian police is weighed down with an impossible quantum of

responsibilities and tasks. This work-pressure adversely affects the
mental balance apart from depriving those tasks from the due attention.
It is impossible to expect a man bogged down with responsibilities and
tasks to spare his time for the niceties of human qualities.
An important measure in humanising the police is to scale down the

work-pressure on it to a bearable level. An element of lightness in work
makes the work environment dulcet and provides an adequate mental space
to devolve on the exuberances of human comportations.
HUMAN ASPECTS
The human aspects is the fulcrum of policing. Human comportment teethed

with authority to compesce the human mass forms the essence of police
activities. Policing essentially is human interaction, latitant in
unending luctation to smite criminal and anti-social elements. It is the
human quality in the force that determines its effectiveness and
vitality. Therefore, human resource policy in a police organisation
needs careful and gritty handling at the highest possible level. People
can afford the luxury of humaneness when they are insulated from the
quotidian diversions of their occupational hazards. A delectable service
atmosphere mellows their responses to those around them. They begin to
see the world in a better light, in conformity with the atmosphere
around them and try to share these pleasant feelings with those they
come in contact with. The levity of the environment and the absence of
strains from the service-front facilitate their opening-up to give vent
to their latitant human contents. An effort to humanise the police
cannot ignore the need to improve service conditions to make the police
proud to be enraced in the vocation. The sense of contentment generated
by the service atmosphere devolves to the public that interacts with the
police. In addition, the public learns to hold the police in esteem in
conformity with its improved service conditions and sophistication. The
interaction between the police and the public can be a sound
substruction for humane policing.
GOOD LIVING CONDITION
A resonably good standard of living helps the police to rise above the
physical and security need-levels to social and higher need-levels in
the need-hierachy outlined by McGregor and have the mental space for
wider intersts like human concerns of kindness, tenderness, elegance and
civility. A low living standard retards the police image and esteem in
society.
The police organisation functions effectively only when a reasonably

good living standard is made affordable to all ranks, so that they can
deal with anti-social elements from a level of strength and confidence
sans the lure of easy booty, thrown en revanche to a let-off. A low
living standard retards the police image and esteem in society, that are
the essentials of successful policing. It is more so in future while
more and more of the so-called elite jump into the fray of criminal
activities in an increasingly complicated society. It is necessary to
make the police financially bein by adequately compensating for the
risks and hazard factors of their jobs to attract the best men to its
fold apart from securing them against financial distractions. A feeling
of condign compensation and contentment is certain to raise the police
above physical and security need levels to give free expression to
natural human tendencies. It may be necessary to make police officers
financially bein in comparision to their counterparts in other services
with risk allowance and hazard allowance to compensate job factors. This
helps to attract the best to the fold of the police organisation, apart
from protecting them from financial distractions. A feeling of condign
compensation is certain to boost the commitment and efficiency of the
police.
HOUSING
Policing is a risky profession that draws antagonism and hatred by its

very nature. It involves round the clock duties, often at odd hours, at
odd places in odd circumstances. Retaliation by criminals is a constant
risk under which policemen live. Their work constantly exposes them to
danger. The very nature of their duties necessitates their being treated
on a different footing to others in the government. The security of
housing and other facilities being genersously available to them is de
rigueur. Indeed the spirit of the ancien regime remains undisturbed in
matters of housing facilities for the police. However, a much more
liberal attitude in providing housing and other facilities to the police
is necessary to strengthen the Indian police and make policing more
effective.
WELFARE ACTIVITIES
Police forces administer welfare funds for the benefit of their members.
The current approach of disbursing money from these funds to needy
applicants needs to arouse a sense of pride and dignity even in
receiving help from the establishment. Much thought has to go into this
aspect to make the welfare funds useful to them without giving the
impression of charity. If the funds go to them as their rightful share,
they would be put to better use than as a charitable contribution. A
newly structured police for the new age certainly requires a fresh
approach to the utilisation of police welfare funds.
TOUGHNESS
The Indian police is not paying sufficient attention to the need for
physical prowess, sturdiness and skill in martial art. The need for
attention to these factors during recruitment, basic training and in
–service challenges is tout a fait ignored. A healthy and sturdy police
requires healthy and sturdy men and officers, capable of taking up
gauntlets and defending themselves when exposed to comminations. The
need can be sidelined only at the risk of weakening the organisation.
The police is often required to defend itself in circumstances when
unarmed and undefended. Policing involves performance of tough and
physically trying jobs that can only be performed when policemen and
police officers are physically and mentally fit. The police, aspiring to
a bright future, must attend to this need for its own good health with
genuine seriousness.
UNIFORM
A change in the existing police uniform is an issue to be deeply probed

into the improve the police image. The present khaki uniform of police
inspires resentment as it is psychologically associated with repression
and violence. A change of police uniform to white or pleasant colours
may prove to be a measure for the better in removing the negative image
of the police. The overall strategy in selecting a new police uniform
should be to infuse a sense of oneness and quality among the ranks of
police and inspiring a psychological disposition of friendliness,
confidence, dignity, respect and healthy fear in the public with a
compulsion to see the police as their own people, but invested with the
responsibility of a noble task.
HUMAN RESOURCES FROM THE PUBLIC
The performance of the Indian police in utilising the services of the

public is far from desirable. Most parts of the country are yet to avail
of the services of the people as special police officers, as is provided
by police regulations to assist in policing. Wherever the services are
availed, the potential is not made use of to the full. The system of
village police officers also is yet to fledge to take off. The use of
people as traffic wardens to assist traffic police is limited to major
cities of India. No police can be tout a fait self-contained. Involving
the public and obtaining its cooperation in policing is a necessary art
which needs to be carefully cultivated for making policing a success
story in India. There is no shortage of people among the public who
would volunteer their services. Only, the police must open its doors to
such services and organise a system to make such services really
effective and useful.
WEAK LEADERSHIP
A factor that seriously affects the morale of a disciplined force like

the police is weak leadership, often affected by disorders of
inferiority complex, in posts from where it can affect the career of
subordinates. This is a very serious situation wherein weak and insecure
leadership holds reins of the career of thousands of subordinates with
many at very senior levels. The feeling of insecurity in them colour
their interpretation of normal conduct of subordinates from their
pusillanimous standpoint to interpret foursquare qualities of
subordinates as surquedry; normal reporting or explanation appears like
an intrigue and tough posture appears like insubordination. A desire to
teach a lesson to the forthright subordinates who make the leadership
feel inferior is a natural outcome of this. This makes retaliation an
ever pensile threat to the career of the subordinates. And the threat,
sine prole is true in the police. This makes people of sound mind, a
must in responsible positions in the police. For an organisation like
the police, the need of sound mind is more basic than any other faculty.
Should the prodigies of virtues like sufferance, intrepidity and
four-square qualities in face of odds constitute the bedrock of the
police organisation, the force make meaningful impact on the society.
The basic tenets of man management in police organisation discussed

above are that a person happy, contented and proud of himself makes his
work situation happy, contentful and something to be proud of, and ipso
facto enriches his work and himself; that man au fond is good natured,
trustworthy and tends to take responsibility and if he is treated as
such, he certainly turns out his best work that if he is convinced that
fairness is the rule of the game, he is the easiest social animal to be
handled. It is left to the police leaders to infuse these tenets in
their man management policy to get most out of the human stuff under
their charges. But the conundrum is that the police leaders need to be
motivated towards the end, and who is to motivate these police leaders
to the task by own man management programmes.?
POLICE STRUCTURE NEEDS THE

MANAGEMETN TOUCH
A major handicap in police administration is the absence of a tool to
assess performance. The problem is, in fact, peculiar to the fields of
crime control and security operations. The object of the organisation is
preventing crimes and success can be measured only in relation to the
extent the efforts pay. As the factors of such an effort are unknown
after the crimes are prevented, the effectiveness of policing can never
be measured. The results that are tangible, namely the successful
protection of a sensitive target or the creation of a crime-free
atmosphere during a particular period, can be the outcome for two
different reasons; either no crime was attempted, in which case even the
least effective police could have produced the same results or an
all-out major attempt to commit crime has been prevented, which could
not have been achieved by anything less than first class policing.
The measurement of the quality of crime investigation and maintenance of

order are also equally complex for different reasons. Policing in these
fields largely depends upon intangible factors such as luck,
surroundings and the willing cooperation of the public. In order to
tackle these problems in gauging policing qualities, the organisation
compares developments in the same period in the preceding years. But
this is an unscientific method and gives unsatisfactory results for
various reasons. The crime rate or other policing problems do not remain
static over a period of time. These depend upon population, complexity
of society, economic conditions, moral values, quality of leadership,
political conditions, prices and climate, none of which follow any
formula.
SUBJECTIVE FANCIES
The police needs, as a control device, a tool to measure policing

quality. Until such a device is invented, the administrators have to
rely upon their subjective fancies to measure and control policing and
assess the work of their subordinates. Until a scientific device is
formulated, the heartburns and frustrations caused by erratic
measurement of work and policing qualities, wherein a few mealy-mouthed
smart guys always corner accolades at the cost of efficient silent
workers, will continue to prevail. A sufficiently active tool to measure
policing qualities is therefore the first priority in the task of
creating a new shape for the Indian police. The success achieved in this
field will decide the degree to which the Indian police can shed its
shoddy image.
The police organisation is being run without requisite management

principles. The major lapse lies in the failure to define organisation
objectives and formulate a specific set of actions thereon. For example
extraneous objectives such as creating employment opportunities often
inspire the creation of additional posts irrespective of the
organisational needs, which results in the corrosion of job contents and
thereby erode the morale of the force. Work, often, is not allocated on
the basis of scientific assessment of character and aptitude.
Sophisticated equipment purchased under modernisation schemes without

creating the infrastructure for their operation or analysing their
relevance and their relative merits to the organisation, have resulted
in their being dumped a few days after commissioning while even some of
the basic needs are yet to be met.
MANAGEMENT PRINCIPLES
The police organisation of India would do well to formulate actions and

operations in line with the latest management principles and practices
followed elsewhere. It may either constitute an efficient cell of
management experts to advice or hire a management consultation firm for
guidance. At any rate, the police organisation of the third millennium
should be a far smaller unit than now, manned by highly committed and
capable officers who are paid and looked after well by the Government.
The last three decades have seen a tremendous expansion in the Indian
police. For the lack of an organisational plan and the foresight to
assess future demands, haphazard growth has resulted. Organisational
sensibilities such as workload, unit of control, accountability
functional conveniences, span of control and information flow are never
given the attention they need building an organisation. As a result,
while a few posts in the police are overburdened with work, there are
many which have no work or accountability. The lopsided growth of the
organisation has spawned acute likes and dislikes for various positions.
Naturally, probity and objectivity are sacrificed in favour of survival
and protection of career interests. Corruption is rampant. This may not
be the sole reason for the falling standards of policing. Yet, it is a
major cause.
Rationalisation of the police structure to bring about a balance among

the various posts in the same rank would certainly help to ameliorate
the situation. It would also help to eliminate the wastage of Government
funds on unnecessary posts. The creation of such posts, in order to
accommodate unwanted elements, cannot be tolerated in a serious
department like the police. A systematic growth plan for balanced
expansion is essential if the department is to meet the tasks ahead.
INSTINCT
For the administrators, the knowledge of modern management principles

makes policing and related operations cheaper, effective and less
demanding in terms of time, place, manpower, equipment and other
resources. The instinct to study and plan operations in terms of layout
charts, time flow, span of control, methods of programming of
operations, motivational aspects, human relationships, information flow,
control methods, work analysis and contingencies for emergencies must be
inherent in police culture whether it pertains to raids, maintenance of
order, crime control, investigation, intelligence collection, security
exercises or simply administration.
Only the meticulous exercise of management techniques will make police

administration meaningful, purposeful and useful in giving the personnel
direction and content.
The present policing system in India has too much of paper work with
hundreds of registers maintained in each station or office with tens of
forms filled up at each stage. A detailed study of the need for paper
work should be taken up to eliminate its need so that time is saved.
Computerisation is also a possibility not far away.
Professional knowledge is vital in the field of policing too. What is at

issue is not only the knowledge of law and procedures but a deeper
insight into their applications, necessary in diverse circumstances. A
mind, alert to its surroundings with an inexhaustible curiosity to know
what is afoot and triggers each development and its likely impact on
policing in general and the worker at hand in particular, is essential
for efficient policing. This entails special efforts to update
professional and general knowledge at all levels. There are training
programmes, including inservice training, but they lack in substance and
quality. They fail to impart the right knowledge to the trainees and
induce attitudinal changes in them. The lack of commitment to work,
either in actual performance or in supervision, is the primary cause of
this failing . A healthy police setup, from the constabulary to the
ranks of the Director-General must possess sound professional and
general knowledge at all levels.
The modernisation of the police force with the latest communication,

transport, weapons and office equipment system and the simultaneous
creation of the necessary infrastructure for their operation in advance
alone will make the police force rise to the challenge of elite
criminals who are armed with sophisticated equipment. India of the third
millennium will require its police force to be equipped with helicopters
as an aide in emergencies. A genuine and effective effort to achieve
modernisation would be indispensable in the future. A face-lift to
police stations and offices with the latest office equipment and general
facilities will go a long way in boosting the morale of the policemen.
INTELLECTUAL ANALYSIS
The passion for modernisation is not met with an intellectual analysis

of the needs for modernisation. The result is spasmodic efforts without
the logistic support to sustain modernistion. This has resulted in
enormous wasteful expenditure towards the acquisition of gadgets. Indian
is yet to develop a system to assess the needs of modernisation in the
police and to devise techniques to speed up the process. India is yet to
make full use of advanced computer facilities for policing,
computerisation of fingerprints is yet to reach a satisfactory phase.
The use of helicopters for policing remains a dream. Distant hearing and
night-watch devices are also unknown.
The response time of the Indian police to a crisis call is unduly long
when compared to international standards. Efforts to shorten it, in
Delhi and few other places where terrorist strikes made shocking impacts
did bring about some improvements. These are only exceptions. Otherwise,
no serious though is given to the need for quick response. The
modernisation programmes which should pave the path for improving the
response time, seldom attend to this salient need.
The Bangalore city police spent liberally in 1991 on modern

communication gadgets; but this did not improve its speed of response.
Instances of such wasteful expenditure on modernisation are available in
other parts of the country also.
Though efforts have been made to redeem the image of the Indian police
nothing substantial has been achieved thanks to amateurish handling of
the affair. The managers have their image development tools limited to
issuing occasional press statements when actually image development has
become a highly advanced. Field of specialisation.
CONSTABULARY.
The constabulary which forms the backbone and cutting-edge of Indian

policing and wields real authority over the populace, is a lowly-paid,
modestly educated, non-elite mass of workes in uniform. The authority
they wield makes them fearsome while their low status in society stands
in the way of their getting empathy and respect. The fearsome authority
sans empathy, respect and legitimacy decidedly proves a deadly
substructure for an organisation and people certainly resent an
organisation with this unhealthy attribute. This foible in the extant
setup makes policing more complex.
The Indian police of the 21st century will require sub-inspectors with
their present scale of education and status in society as the primary
unit of policing at the cutting-edge level. Constables up to the level
of Assistant Sub-Inspectors of Police should be limited to the duties of
assistants without police powers and responsibilities. This will require
a huge army of subinspectors while the contabulary stands to be severely
spruced in strength.
With the removal of the constabulary from the hierarchy, the

sub-inspectors will occupy the lowest rank in the setup. Each police
station works under a police inspector assisted by a host of
sub-inspectors, performing all subordinate functions including beat
patrolling and investigation of minor cases.
Diligent efforts at the highest level in the organisation to create a

force characterised by integrity, commitment and intelligence may be the
foremost need of a police organisation of the future. The prevalence of
police administration over general administration in the survival of a
nation as a democratic and disciplined country may necessitate changes
in the recruitment and service condition rules to attract the best
talent.
WORK ASSESSMENT
The system of assessment of work for promotion has fallen into utter
misuse. Subjective assessments of corrupt influences must be replaced
with periodical promotions in a time scale of say, 25 years. So every
police constable retires at least as an Assistant Sub-Inspector of
Police, a Sub-Inspector as a Deputy Superintendent of Police and an
Indian Police Service Officer as an Inspector General of Police. The
officers of the Indian Police Service may be posted, on first
appointment, as Superintendents to make the career more attractive,
though not to districts directly. And dual recruitments as in vogue now,
has to be stopped to make selection meaningful.
Officers, in exceptional cases, may have avenues for special promotions

in addition to the two provided in a time scale of say 25 years, on the
basis of a written examination and on an overall assessment of their
career of 25 years by high-power committees formed for the purpose. The
promotion of constabulary in exceptional cases to the ranks of PSIs and
above should be screened by the All –India Police Authority and the
promotion of an IPS officer as the Director General of Police and above
should be approved by a Central Cabinet Committee headed by the Prime
Minister
Where their loyalties lie...

THE primary duty of the police is to maintain order which would
include enforcing the law and the prevention and detection of
crime. The police ought to be concerned about the interests of
the general public, the standard of the law, the administration
of justice and the security parameters that ensure it. Loyalty is
the foundation on which the police organisation is built up.
Loyalty, would mean steadfast adherence to what is legal and the
law as the word `loyalty' originates from the Latin lex and
legalis.Policing, as a profession in a democracy, denotes
fidelity to the sovereignty of the people and necessitates
upholding the law of the country, keeping up the orderly life of
the common man and safeguarding peace and security.
This is where the police differ from private armies. Disaster

strikes when the police function as the private armies of the
ruling political party or any influential member of society. The
police in India have fallen into this quagmire, its vitality and
profesionalism pushed to the background.
Loyalty is of two kinds. One is pure and simple fidelity to the

master. The other owes its allegiance to certain ideals and
principles. This implies allegiance to one's duties,
responsibilities, objectives, profession and the chosen path of
life. This commitment raises their loyalty to the status of a
mission. The loyalty needed in a profession like that of the
police is of elevated nature and it bestows the qualities of
nobility and dignity on the organisation. It lifts the police
above factional interests and gives them a cosmopolitan vitality.
The strength and the trust born out of this superior form of
loyalty stand the police force in good stead in its hour of risk
and crisis.
It is tragic that the Indian police prefer to trade this

characteristic for trivial and ephemeral benefits. The trend has
spread like wildfire to ravage the institution. The genesis lies
in the promotion of career prospects and other perks dumb loyalty
brings to individuals. Personal loyalty to political masters
takes some people to the top, tempting others to follow suit.
The models created a pattern and the pattern became a part of the
system in a setup where individuality and orginality are not
sacred. The real threat lies in the possibility of this tendency
coming to be accepted as the true character of the police. This
may not take long to happen if the present goings on are any
indication.
The malady is not limited to a particular state or unit. There

can be hope of remedy if there is at least one example of the
right model. But none seems to be available. Isolated attempts to
tread the right path are seen as deviations from the mainstream.
This is the beginning of the atrophy of the Indian police. How
far the degeneration has spread is evident from the way some
important criminal cases of political significance have been 0};3
handled. A criminal case warrants professional loyalty in its
investigation to bring the culprits to book. The political status
of the accused and the fall-out are irrelevant to the process of
investigation.
The misconceptions about loyalty with a slant in favour of the

political masters and other powerful influence-pedlars have
clouded this vital aspect of policing. With the result, the rule
of law has suffered and the administration of justice is
crippled. The damage already done to the country's public life
cannot be repaired until the police are brought back on the rails
of loyalty to their profession.
The police, whether it is the Special Protection Group, the

Intelligence Bureau, the Research and Analysis Wing or the
Central Bureau of Investigation, survive the transient political
masters and their political groups in power. Their relevance to
the country is more abiding than that of the politicians in
power. In the circumstances, the police ought not to be
subservient to the political masters whose future is
unpredictable. The police going loyal to transient political
interests certainly will damage and debase the system itself.
It is a common practice in some States to change key officers
when a new dispensation takes over the rule. A recent example is
from Tamil Nadu. And this is not an isolated case. It reflects
the attitude of the political leadership towards the professional
loyalties of the police. Public opinion about the professional
loyalty of the police is rather low.
Politicians believe that all those in the police are commodities

that can be bought and ``loyal'' policemen to make a substantial
difference to their political fortunes. Hence the mad rush to
place favourite police officers in key positions. Thus
politicians exploit the weakness of the organisation. The culprit
here is the perverted loyalties of the police. What is termed as
political interference is patently the making of the police by
their personal loyalties.
The intelligence unit is the most abused section and its chief is
the most willing tool. Intelligence officers have a
responsibility to their organisational objectives and they ought
to work towards meeting their objectives. But misplaced loyalties
restrict the scope of the intelligence units which are seen as
the lackeys of the ruling parties and their leaders. The
usefulness of the intelligence units as political tools is so
pronounced in India that they are brought under the direct
control of the Chief Executive of the Government from the
traditional Home Department and the chiefs are the main advisers
of the Chief Executive, head and shoulders above even the Chief
Secretaries in States and the Cabinet Secretary at the Centre.
This importance is a reward for the lengths to which these

officers would go risking their personal and career safety and
indulge in illegal acts to oblige the political masters. p73
Telephone tapping and shadowing political rivals of the ruling
party leaders are only minor prevarications these loyal police
officers indulge in to keep themselves in the good books of their
political masters.
Assessing the political trends and suitability of candidates in

different constituencies during elections and reporting the
activities of politicians within and outside the ruling party are
now wrongly seen as legitimate functions of the intelligence
units.
Mr. Chandra Sekhar, former Prime Minister, in response to a

question on the Jain hawala case during the 11th Lok Sabha
election campaign, said the investigation of corruption cases was
the job of a Police Inspector and not that of a Minister. That
answer would be right in an ideal situation where the police
function professionally, with their loyalty fixed to their
duties. It has no relevance in a situation where policemen are
loyal to individuals or groups in power. The police being the
executive edge of the administration, their loyalties make all
the difference to the quality of administration.
Factional loyalties have the singular potentiallity of eroding

fairness and impartiality. They make professional loyalty seem
meaningless. A mature and sober political leadership can set
right the fractured loyalties of the police organisation. In this
context, judicial activism, in a periodical review of the
progress of investigation of some cases of national importance,
is a welcome step although in normal circumstances such a
judicial review would have amounted to interference in the
independent functioning of the investigating authority.
The duty of providing the right guidance and direction to the

police lies with the political leadership. Ironically, the police
force has become an object of ridicule by being asked to
investigate certain affairs of the politicians with whom its
absolute loyalty lies and who twist policemen around their little
fingers.
THE INDIAN POLICE: MALADIES AND

REMEDIES
The nexus between criminals, politicians and policemen has made
the police totally ineffectual when it comes to maintaining law
and order. Only if this nexus is broken and the police force totally
revamped, will Indians be able to life without fear.
Crime, politics and the police are the 3 sides of the vicious triangle
within which democratic India and its free people are inexorably caught
today. Though wealthy industrial and commercial houses form the 4th
dimension of this unfortunate situation, their manipulative strategies
are as yet limited to trying to influence politicians in pursuit of
their interests.
It is their wealth that operates as a catalyst in reducing the normal

life of free citizens to a welter of uncertainties and unending
hardships. However, their role is rather distant and indirect, unlike
that of criminals, politicians and the police.
Politicians protect criminals from the law while criminals reciprocate
by acting as their henchmen in handling underground activities. The
police goes to the politicians for job protection while at the same time
it strikes an understanding with criminals. Thus works this nexus of
vile power brokers who prey on innocent people and suck the blood of the
hapless masses.
The trio of criminal, political and police manipulators is a dangerous

force to reckon with, in the Indian democratic situation. A tight-knit
power-bloc, they have permeated into all conceivable facets of Indian
public life with the sole intention of garnering all the benefits of an
inefficient public administration. The tragedy here is that this evil is
perpetrated by those whom the public trust as their benefactors and
protectors.
The amoral side of this operation does not seen to have affected either
the police or the politicians in any way and the vile cabal against, the
Indian public works on indifferent to everything except its own
self-interest. It seems that all the actors in this tragic drama think
that the Indian democracy is a free-for-all, where they should try to
grab all that they can in a world where each person has to look after
himself.
This approach is certain to undermine not only the democratic set-up of

the nation, but also its social fabric. The blame for this sad state of
affairs should be squarely borne by the ugly troika of politicians,
criminals and the police.
All the maladies of the police today emanate from the politicians who
are only concerned with winning the next election. Until it extricates
itself from their grip, it cannot hope to rise above its present
mediocre level.
An immediate need is to streamline the organisation. At present, the

growth of the police department is not really much more than a spasmodic
reaction to various stimuli and as a result it lacks the benefits of an
integrated approach. Operational facilities, counter-balances and
counter-checks are inadequate.
The constitution of a permanent cell of organisational experts under the

direct control of the police chief to redefine the police organisation
is required to make it more meaningful and need-based.
This could help in streamlining the hierarchy by identifying and

eliminating redundant posts, by rationalising workloads and preventing
their duplication and by redefining duties and procedures and thus the
rights and responsibilities at each level. As a consequence, police
functioning would be made more cost-effective and efficient.
UNATTRACTIVE SERVICE
The accusation that no talent breeds and grows in the wilderness of the
police set-up cannot be easily gainsaid. The Indian Police Service
continues to be an intellectually poor and unattractive service in the
spectrum of the All –India services with only misfits opting for its.
The constabulary, which forms the bulk of the service, is largely

constituted of people from the lower stratum of society who are
psychologically handicapped when it comes to exercising their police
powers against the more enlightened people in society.
A tendency to sideline superior intellect and excellence, a general

reluctance to adopt modern techniques of policing and management, a
dogmatic approach to personnel and public relations and a lack of
insight into human nature are other factors responsible for the
unfortunate state of affairs in the force.
These problems can be overcome only by capable police leadership at all

levels. The organisation is bound to experience a glissade until
objectivity, reasonableness and good judgement become a part of the
police administration.
travesty of what it was originally meant to be. In no way, under the
capabilities or lack thereof. Many therefore believe that the department
would be better off without this pernicious evaluation process that
encourages corruption and favouritism in the force.
It must, however, be said that the evils of the ACR are not inherent in
the process itself, but stem rather from the calibre of those who write
them at various levels. What characterises the rite of the ACR today is
a distinct lack of objectivity: it has become a means to personal ends,
a medium for the advancement of individual interests and even the
settlement of personal scores.
Servility is its inevitable consequence and it would not be wrong to say

that eliminating the ACR altogether would certainly be a step towards
commune bonum in the police force.
A Deputy Inspector General of Police in a range wanted a young Deputy

Superintendent of Police to marry a girl close to him. The
self-respecting DSP chose to marry a girl of his own choice. This
antagonised the Deputy Inspector General. His next annual confidential
report showed the junior as a liability to the police department.
The senior officer also prevailed year after year upon other officers to
incorporate adverse remarks in the confidential reports of the junior.
Most of them obliged and this bright junior officer ended up with a
series of unsubstantiated adverse remarks in his confidential reports.
All his appeals were ignored by the Government. As a result, the young
officer was denied selection to the IPS for the next 9 years while his
far less competent colleagues superseded him on the career ladder,
though there is nothing in his career to justify such treatment.
Undeterred by the humiliation and career setbacks intentionally heaped

on him he then requested the Chief Secretary of the Government not to
consider him any more for the IPS. He took this measure to show his
utter contempt of the corrupt departmental heads who sit above him to
decide his fate.
There are numerous instances of unhealthy practices at the highest

levels in the Indian police. Karnataka produced a police chief who,
together with his wife, was taken to court on the eve of his retirement,
from service by a prominent social worker for allegedly defrauding the
public and a spastic society by siphoning off huge amounts of money,
collected for the spastics.
It is a different story that the officer concerned succeeded in

silencing the social worker through police pressure and ensured that the
case fell through for lack of evidence. The incident betrays the levels
to which occupying high positions in the Indian police stoop to make a
few bucks.
In such an atmosphere with the maintenance of law and order in the hands
of unprincipled police personnel. Queer things take place. Long ago, a
dacoity was reported in the house of a person of doubtful character in
Dharwad district in Karnataka.
The dacoity was actually committed by the illegitimate son of the

concerned person after a serious quarrel. The complainant later settled
his feud with the illegitimate son and decided to settle the case of
dacoity to save his family name.
He successfully arranged for an ex-convict of Stuartpuram to be picked

up and shown as the accused. A mangalasutra recast from the gold
recovered in some other case was shown as property seized from the
criminal !
Such developments make a mockery of criminal justice. What a serious

breach of public trust it is for the police to involve a person, albeit
an ex-convict, in a crime which they knew he did not commit. The
incident reveals the levels of criminality to which the Indian police
has sunk.
INHUMAN TORTURE
In another instance in 1981, police officials in charge of Koppal

sub-division in Karnataka picked up a poor goldsmith from Gadag in a
neighbouring district for interrogation about receiving stolen property.
They subjected him to inhuman torture in the Gadag tourist bungalow for
2 nights to make the innocent goldsmith confess to crimes which he had
not committed.
The wife and children of the goldsmith, who found him in the tourist
bungalow after endless running from pillar to post, were chased away
from the place though they could hear his agonised shrieks. The
goldsmith succumbed to the torture on the second night.
The news of the lock-up death, as such deaths are popularly called, was
splashed in local and other newspapers. The wife of the goldsmith filed
a complaint before the local court about the cold-blooded murder of her
husband.
The district Superintendent of Police and the Range Deputy Inspector

General of Police, whose protégé the sub-divisional police officer was,
rose to the occasion to save him.
They visited Gadag and entrusted the investigation of the case to the
compliant Deputy Superintendent of Police of a neighbouring sub-division
with oral directions to finalise the case as “not proved” before the
magistrate, who had received the wife’s complaint and taken cognisance
of the plaint.
The Deputy Superintendent of Police complied with these directions and

sent his investigation report to the court for action u/s 210 of the
Cr.PC. Thus ended the case of cold-blooded torture and culpable homicide
of an innocent goldsmith.
Such stories of cruelty and criminality make the police appear like
demons. What right has the police to investigate and prosecute criminals
while it protects its own killers?
Though it is difficult to extricate the police machinery from the
clutches of the politicians, it is an important measure that has to be
undertaken at al costs in the overall interests of the country
If policing is to be effective in the years ahead, specialisation is

crucial. Three distinct police services with separate recruitment and
training are needed. These are:
1. Regulatory police or uniformed police in charge of law and order

And other regulatory duties.
2. Mainstay police in charge of crime investigation, crime prevention,
Security and intelligence operation.
3. Social police in charge of prevention and investigation of all social
Offences and implementation of social legislation.
All the 3 wings should have their own individual organisations up to the
district level with independent superintendents and staff as required.
They should function in tandem in much the same way as the army, navy
and air force do.
At the apex could be a specially constituted body called the State

police authority with police chiefs of all the 3 wings as members and
the Chief Secretary to the Government as its Chairman.
A PANACEA
Creation of an all-India police authority at the Centre, responsible

only to the President of India, with regional police authorities in each
State as subordinate bodies, may prove to be a panacea to most of the
extant maladies of the Indian police.
The all-India police authority may be headed by a Supreme Court judge

with the Union Home Secretary and Central Cabinet Secretary as members
and the senior most police officer of the country as the
member-secretary.
The arrangement is likely to bring to an end the undue interference by

politicians in police affairs, thus enabling the police to function in
an independent atmosphere. The Indian police may hope to function well
in the new age if these measures are implemented.
WHERE PROACTIVE JUDICIARY LEADS INDIA?

Be you ever so high, the law is above you’ said J.S.Verma Former Chief
Justice of India. The law of the country represents the aspirations of
the people in running the country in a democracy. That is the adhesive
that binds the people, the country and its administration together. That
is the thread that holds them together into a system and defines the
latter’s ends and its means. In this sense, law is above the people,
above the country and above its administration. Taken away the law,
people do not remain people, country does not remain a country and
administration does not remain administration. Sans law, there just will
be a jungle raj.
LEGISLATURE, EXECUTIVE AND JUDICIARY
Law protects people, country and the administration as much as people,

country and the administration protect the law. The ultimate
responsibility of protecting the law lies on the administration.
Legislature, Executive and judiciary as Brihma, Vishnu and Maheshwara,
the all powerful trinity of the Hindu mythology, share the peise of
protecting the interests of the rule of law. Legilslature creates law,
Executive enforces it and judiciary adjudicates it. Difficulties surface
while Brihma, Vishnu and Maheshware begin to encroach into other’s
domain for supremacy by claiming themselves as the true arbitrators of
the interests of the people, and each seeks to usurp the
responsibilities of the other eo nomine. India is witnessing the farce
in its democratic system on the eve of golden jubilee celebrations of
its partition and independence.
A PAWN IN THE POWER-GAME
Sine Dubio, Legislature let down the country by over-indulgence in petty

politicking and Executive plunged itself in ineffciency and corruption
to be any more relevant to the interests of the country. Similarly,
goings- on behind the veil of the threat of contempt proceedings in
Judiciary is in no way really sobering. Any one of them taking advantage
of the general breakdown by raising accusing fingers on the other and
assuming on itself, the role of the champion of public interest may not
ported well to the democratic traditions of the country. Such an
eventuality does stir the hopes, expectations and imagination of the
frustrated and defeated hoi polloi. But, as time wears off, they come to
realise the power-game for supremacy among the contenders. The plebeian
more and more understands that he played as a pawn in the power-game.
This deepens his frustration and intensifies his sense of hurt, defeat
and let down. This is what is happening to Indians after half a century
of self-rule in the rumblings of the pro-active judiciary.
LIMITATIONS OF THE JUDICIARY
Legislature, Executive and Judiciary have their own roles to play as

demarcated by the Constitution. Article 142 (1) of the Constitution of
India while dealing with the enforcement of Supreme Court orders
perspicaciously lays down as, ”The Supreme Court in the exercise of its
jurisdiction may pass such decree or make such order as in necessary for
doing complete justice in any cause or matter pending before it, and any
decree so passed or order so made shall be enforceable throughout the
territory of India in such manner as may be prescribed by or under any
law made by Parliament and, until provision in that behalf is so made,
in such manner as the President may by order prescribe. “ The Article
provides a clue to the spirit of the Constitution in matters of the
responsibilities and limitations of the Judiciary vis a vis overall
governance. The key phrases that prescribe the role of Judiciary here
are “in the exercise of its jurisdiction”, ‘ for doing complete justice,
‘ in any cause or matter pending before it’ and enforceable….. as may be
prescribed by or under any law made by Parliament . The phrases make
perspicuous two limitations on the Judiciary, namely that it shall act
only on matters pending before it in exercise of its jurisdiction for
doing complete justice, and that the operation of its decree or order is
subject to the law made by Parliament or Presidential order. The
limitation of jurisdiction and the need of matters being pending before
it, together constitutes a serious limitation on the Judiciary to do
anything ‘ for doing complete justice. The role of the extant pro-active
Judiciary has to be discussed under the light of these limitations.
USURPING EXECUTIVE POWERS
Judiciary indubitably is responsible for doing complete justice. Facts

and evidences are the basic tenets of modern judicial system and
judiciary cannot overstep these needs in its entrainement of doing
complete justice. Executive exercises the power of transferring
investigating officers and other police personnel selon les regles. Jus
naturale dictates that anybody encroaching upon the jurisdiction of the
other for whatever reasons amounts to usurping the powers of the other
by postern means. Judiciary as the ultimate machinery of providing
justice, resorting to superrogatory means to meet a cause amounts to
irrevocable breakdown of the Constitution and the rule of law and
Executive en attendant finds itself nowhere to go for redressal against
the injustice. Being the ultimate dispenser of justice, weighs down the
Judiciary with the need of being moderate circumspect and scrupulous in
its means. Supercilious radicalism by the Judiciary prompted by
procacity is like wild run of a bull in a chinashop.
People cannot approach anybody for redressal when they are wronged by
the Judiciary and the sword of contempt proceedings constantly hang over
their heads lest they open their mouths in public. Self restraint is the
lex non scripta of a sound Judiciary. There is nothing so fatal to the
independence and democratic traditions of the country as the delubrum of
the rule of law and justice with all its special powers and privileges
growing to be a cimmerian monster. The sickly developmetn violates the
very raison d’etre of the Judiciary. When Judiciary fails to recognise
its limitations ex mero motu, none is there to do it for it. Uberrima
fides is basic to Judiciary. When Judiciary prevaricates from its
rightful path, that rings the death-knell of the democracy and leads the
country to the ineluctable anarchy through constitutional breakdown.
LOSS OF CREDIBILITY
Intentions of the Judiciary may be good. But, intentions alone do not

constitute the right to act in anyway desired. Indian Constitution does
not provide for that even “ for doing complete justice”. Supreme Court
of India on its verdict on 13 August laid guidelines to protect the
interests of working women from sexual harassment and ruled that the
guidelines would be in force till due legislations replace them.
Intentions of the court in such a course of action is definitely very
`noble. But means pursued to the end may not be in the best interests of
the country and its constitutional machinery. Judiciary acting on Public
Interest petitions is certainly a step forward towards better judicial
system. But, Judicial meddling in every state affair outside its
jurisdiction may prove costly to both the Judiciary and the country.
Indian Judiciary is certainly losing sight of the difference between
pronouncing judgements and making Executive orders. The latter part of
the Article 142 (1) clearly dictates that the operation of the decree or
order made by the court is subject to the law made by Parliament or
Presidential Order. The Executive Orders, Indian Judiciary now ends to
make are in violation of the spirit of the above constitutional
provision. The parturition of the Judiciary to shift polluting
industries from the heart of Delhi to the outskirts pro bono publico,
led to stirrings against the very well-meaning verdict. Paroxysms of the
Judiciary in Patna in Bihar Fodder Scam and later on the use of Article
356 in Bihar led to open protests in Parliament and outside. The
apostasy Indian Judiciary suffers by encroachment on the domains of the
Executive and the loss of restraint in Judicial proceedings lead
judiciary to the cul de sac of the loss of dignity and credibility.
Unless those at the helm in Indian Judiciary wake up from their

somnolency and realise where indiscreetness in their part is leading the
country to, the future of Indian democracy is bound to be bleak and
mired in incertitude and disaster.
INTERNAL SECURITY- CHALLENGES AND APPROACH
In an age of sabotage and terrorism, no man, no place and no structure
is really safe; no time of the day or night can be construed as safe.
With the increasing complexity of human society with increasing claims
on the limited resources of the world, the kettle of human life Is
spilling over with organised hatred and violence. Terrorism has become
an international phenomenon. Accrescent unemployment makes terrorism
popular by giving the unemployed youth a raison d’etre for life and an
ideology to pursue. The lopsided material growth of 20th century life at
the cost of contentment and inner peace have endeared to man the thrills
and adventures of the life that fills up his inner void. New scientific
inventions give man such sophisticated mechanisms and machinery that he
can do anything he wants without being personally present at a place.
Each man has potentially become a power-centre and he can build or
destroy the world he lives in. The rise in hatred and violence,
compounded with man’s dangerous power to wreak vengeance, has made
internal security an unsure field. It has become the primary challenge
for the police force, replacing its hitherto main functions of crime
control and maintenance of law and order.
The threat to internal security is posed by highly trained and motivated

volunteers belonging to highly organised and resourceful terrorist
outfits. The unenviable task of providing protection to men, places and
structures from these committed zealots with the choice of time, place
and target in their favour and any number of sophisticated methods and
techniques of strike to choose from, continually sap the manpower,
machinery and other resources of the police. Even in the advanced
countries the police find it difficult to cope with the problem. The
police should have led in modernisation techniques with the antipode
marching to keep pace. Unfortunately, it is not so in the Indian
situation.
The reaction of the police to terrorist threats is desperate mobbing and

covering the target at best and diffident immobilisation at the worst.
Their inability to penetrate terrorist organisations has put it at a
costly disadvantage. Their failure to draw up detailed long-term plans
to meet terrorist challenges handicaps them in their operations.
Internal security cannot be guaranteed sans a sound knowledge of the
terrorists’ way of functioning.
SPASMODIC APPROACH
An internal security machinery working in a void often gives rise to

ludicrous security reactions. Anonymous calls or letters in most
unlikely situations are attended to with a desperate mobilisation of men
and machinery without scrutinising the call or the letter, and
everything ends up as a hoax. An anonymous Kannada letter claimed to
have been written by the LTTE was received in Mysore with the threat of
blowing up the KRS dam on the intervening right of August 14 and 15, in
1991 and was later followed with similar threats of blowing up the
Vidhana Soudha on the same night. Somebody wellversed with the LTTE
objectives, expertise and method of operation would have dismissed the
calls and the letters as a non-even. But the Karnataka police had to be
prepared for an emergency because it was not equipped to handle internal
security problems with courage and confidence. It is not wrong to be
ready to meet threats but, the action should be subtle without fanfare
and unnecessary show of strength. Desperate reaction may prompt
mischievous elements to shoot similar missives almost daily. Can the
police react to all those letters similarly? It is subtle planning and
low-key operation that make security possible. All security arrangements
must be preceded by through research and detailed plans. This is
completely forgotten in the Indian situation.
Not many are involved in an expertly drawn-up operational plan of

sabotage. It is quality that counts and not quantity in both sabotage
and security operations. Those who really execute the sabotage are
highly motivated trained and competent individuals. The larger the
number, the smaller the chances of success because of human nature,
coordination problems and higher chances of leakage. Also it involves
the problem of providing security and escape routes for more men in the
post-operational period. No number of policemen can stop a highly
motivated and trained man from sneaking up to his target and destroying
it. What is required is not companies of policemen, but a handful of
highly qualified and motivated men of experience with an intelligent,
thoroughly drawn up security plan, based on reliable intelligence inputs
about the objects and operational plans of the adversary. Everything
except these salient features is present in the responses of the Indian
police to security challenges.
Indian security plans ignore the cardinal principle of a good

reticulation, namely providing security without coming in the way of the
normal life of the target except where unavoidable. The essence of
security buildup is protection with minimum inconvenience to the
concerned. But Indian security sleuths feel otherwise. They believe in
taking charge of the target, be it a place, an installation, or a person
and dictating terms as though the security is given in exchange for
freedom of movement and action. And all this for inadequate security.
But even national leaders have traded their image and popularity for
this supposed safety.
It is argued that the Indian security system is effective in

discouraging the less resourceful terrorist outfits from attempting
strikes and preventing half-hearted attacks. The argument is not
convincing for the simple reason all terrorist outfits worth the name
are extremely resourceful with objectives, plans and strategies and a
complete commitment to carry out their operational plans. No target is
out of their reach. If a target is not struck for a long time, the
reasons can be only three, a) the outfit has not really intended to
strike, b) the outfit is yet to equip itself c) that security sleuths
could be exclusively covering the target making a strike impossible.
India should reach a stage where the third reason which is an exception
now becomes the rule. The failure to capture Sivarasan and Subha,
suspects in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, is a recent event. The
chance intelligence, as early as in August, 1991, that both extremists
were holed up with others in a ramshackle house at Konanakunte in
Karnataka did not enable the Indian security forces to catch them alive
with all the time, resources and the element of surprise at their
disposal.
This reflects on the serious loopholes in the field of security planning

in India. Instead of inventing an undercover strategy to draw the
extremists out or entering their den as friends with the help of
undercover agents, the police failed to surprise the suspects and
surrounded them. What happened was not only the suicide of the
extremists which was expected but the operation to nab the culprits
virtually ended there.
The reason for such bungling is that Indian security operation does not
go much beyond the multiple crack forces-Black Cats, National Security
Guards, Special Protection Group and so on. Indeed, these crack forces
are important but they are only the ammunition and not the weapon. An
exhaustive internal security plan on which all security strategies and
operations are based must be the gospel of the internal security
religion. Sadly, India is yet to have such a macro-plan to guide its
security sleuths.
PROBLEMS
The problems of security are manifold. First is intelligence collection.

Often, true and false information are so much entwined that it is
impossible to distinguish one from the other. Even if a piece of
information is identified as true, it loses its value standing in the
midst of useless material. That isolated piece of information is removed
from the adversary’s action plan and when pursued leads to wrong
conclusions and dangerous situations. Continued research is a must to
utilise the information in action . This again depends upon the skill
and experience of the individual or group of individuals who handle the
job. Often, both the research and analysis are carried out under the
pressure of time because of the proximity of the threat. Both
intelligence and its source must be kept a closely guarded secret. Any
leak may prompt an adversary to modify his plan which will annul the
security operation. This creates problems of mobilisation and deployment
without rousing suspicion. The men to handle the security operation
should be handpicked for competence and probity. Their antecedents and
recent activities must be closely examined before they are cleared. It
is the failure of security agencies to effectively carry out such
preparations that cost Indian Indira Gandhi.
The briefing of security operations about their job itself poses a

problem. The time of briefing must be carefully chosen so that while the
gap between the impending operation and the briefing gives sufficient
time to the operators for preparation, it must not be too long. The
timing of briefing and development must be decided at high levels to
ensure perfect secrecy. And, how much can be told? Security operation
basically involves the creative initiative of the operator. His success
depends upon the ability to assess the situation and pursue a better
course of action without loss of time. Success also depends on how much
briefing must be made to operators at various ranks and levels and how
much information and background knowledge can be fed to them. Here
again, liberal outlets for vital information create security risks. The
primary requirement of any security operation is a thorough study and
analysis of intelligence and other inputs, a comprehensive plan of
operation with flexibility to meet contingencies.
Timing is an essential ingredient of security planning and decides the

success or failure of an operation. It lends the element of surprise.
Not that everything traditional is irrelevant today. For instance, the

strategy of quadruple deployment-static guards, armed pickets, mobile
patrols and striking forces for a static target. Standing guards,
personal security officer, inner cordon, outer cordon and striking force
are deployed for a human target while for a mobile target a security
officer, escort, piloting and striking force will form the skeleton of
the system. However, it should be borne in mind that this strategy in no
way replaces specific security strategies; it only complements them.
Security, its challenges and counter strategies are ever-growing

phenomena. An effective strategy must foresee challenges and arm itself
in advance. The country faces challenges from the Kashmiri separatist
movement in the North, the Akali separatist movement in the West, the
ULFA in the East, the LTTE in the South and the naxalites in the Centre.
The number of new security outfits coming up is an indication of India’s
concern but then the accent is misplaced on quantity in the form of a
new security outfit every time a serious security breach shakes the
country, rather than on improving the quality. Until the country learns
the basic lessons of modern security, tragic deaths and destruction are
bound to continue.
INDIAN POLICE NEEDS HEALTHY JOB CULTURE

Policemen are social doctors and policing is a surgical operation of the
society to systematically remove cancerous growths from its body. What
if the band of doctors itself is infested with serious cancerous
growths? This is the position of the present- day Indian police. The
police, as the enforcers of law and protectors of the public interests,
wield tremendous powers for the public good. Such powers to interfere
with the life of the citizens must be invested only in people of high
probity and conscience. Otherwise, the powers by themselves ruin the
social fabric of the country and bring anarchy. Powers to search, seize,
remove, detain, direct, arrest, hit and even kill may prove pernicious
in the wrong hands. Powers to decide who has done wrong and how to
prosecute them, when invested in dishonest hands, certainly ruin society
and the country. How these powers are exercised depends imprimis on the
work-ethic of the organisation. Though it is the people of an
organisation au fond who build the job-culture of the organisation, it
is this job–culture of the organisation that creates a person in the
organisation at a given point of time. Even a degenerate caractere turns
honest and efficient in an honest and efficient environment. The work
culture builds and moulds vitality to meet the general atmosphere
around. Similarly, an honest and efficient person in a degenerate
culture is bound to atrophy sooner or later, unless his individual
strength superates the vitiating work-culture of the organisation, Ergo,
building up a proper job-culture is the bedrock of a perficient police
organisation.
India, as one of the foremost and largest democracies of the world, have
a great burden on its flabby shoulders to prove to the world that
democracy as a form of government can stand up to any dissipating
influence and hold disparate geographical, racial, ethnical, linguistic,
religious, cultural and economic factors syndetic in its pandemic prise
of liberal benevolence and serve the cause of the unity of the sovereign
country at all odds. The gauntlet India faces in this regard is made
kenspeckle by the locus standi or the country in terms of its position
as a ranking leader of the developing countries. Human nature being as
it is, the emerging atmosphere of commercialisation and material
comforts vis a vis accrescent concours for limited resources of the
Earth , makes man increasingly self-centered and more and more
adventurous and violent in his appropinquation to reach his
self-appointed narrow goals. It is true of all social divisions
including religions, language groups, ethnic divides, cultural interests
and national aspirations. Communal hatred, linguistic barriers, ethnic
clashes, cultural bickerings and threats to the national security are
orders of the day rather than exceptions with the trends betraying the
indicia of dangerous chorisis. Democracy, unfortunately, is a fertile
ground of such degenerate tendencies because of the trust democracy lays
wrongly on the basic nature and general abilities of common man. The
trust is wrongly laid for the reason that democracy fails to take into
account the reality of the limosis in man which creates all which
creates all havocs and assesses man as just a need-oriented simple
animal. Liberalisation that forms part of democracy, in cahoots with
material interpretations of life, in spite of myriad benefit and
comforts it brings with it, certainly poison the atmosphere to the
extent of comminating the very foundation of the democracy and the unity
of the country. This is where the police comes to the picture to control
the situation and save the democracy from its own vices.
The police in a democracy is the watchdog of the democracy. Democracy

basically being the rule of the hoi polloi, clash of interests therein
is an expected feature. In an atmosphere of self-rule by the
self-centred people of the present commercial world, a machinery to show
people their limits and punish devious elements in sine qua non. The
police forms the master-axle that runs this vital engine of the
administration. It being the ultimate executors of the laws, rules and
regulations that form the chemistry of a rule of law, whatever be the
other attributes of an administration, its efficiency, quality and
success tout a fait depend upon the merits of the police, the democracy
evolves for itself. In the atmosphere of 20th and 21st centuries’
unified world, like all other social and administrative apparatus,
Indian police too have most of its external patterns modelled after the
police organisations in other countries rather than evolved ab intra.
This is true in pre-independent era as well as in post-independent age.
In pre-independent era because, the then rulers namely the British
modelled Indian police on the patterns of their own police back in
England. In post–independent age because, independent India’s new rulers
continue with the system left by the British except for spasmodic
retouches here and there in response to time to time compulsions of the
realities in the fields of crime, security and law and order of the
country. Though the retouches made their appearances from the field
realities, the ideas and models are algate modelled on parallel
machinery in other countries. It is true about the gestalts and
protocols of India’s own Research and Analysis Wing or Intelligence
Bureau or Central Bureau of Investigation or Paramilitary forces or
crack-forces or anti terrorist-squads or organisations to fight
narcotics and other economic offences or normal police station, district
and state police administration. It is not to say that Indian police is
tout ensemble alien to Indian situation just because of its tramontane
jacket. Far from it. Indian police in its foreign jacket goes perforce
Indian in its soul with concomitant advantage and disadvantages of
Indian spirit, because Indian police works in Indian situation and ispo
facto adapts to Indian needs and spirit. The utility of Indian police to
India depends upon the direction and degree to which Indian police have
taken to this process of adaptation and also how successfully and
efficiently. It is in this perspective, the role of the police in
reconstruction of India, expectations from it, actual chevisance and its
import on national life are discussed.
India’s experiments in democracy are sui generis and stand apart from
similar experiments otherwhere by the non a such characteristics of the
country, its people, their aspirations and historical background. Though
the process of adaptation to democracy was not guided by any deliberate
plan to be different, India’s very own situations dictated terms to the
shapes to be moulded specific to its values, needs and aspirations. The
growth of India’s police remained faithful to these shapes more suo.
It is a fact that an organised effort is on in Indian police to force

its members to fall in with its line of profile at the cost of
individual brilliance and creative height. Indian police are
continuously starved of freshness and creative innovations as the result
of shutting itself to the creative sparks and other precious attributes
of its human resources. Such a wastage of available human resources can
occur only in a government setup of a developing country like India.
What surprises is the extent to which the organisation goes to nip in
bud excellences to perpetuate the interests of its old, secure world of
unquestioning servilitude down the line. All loud talks of Indian police
leaders on public platforms about the need of infusing excellence and
outstanding qualities to the police organisation are shenanigans meant
for the consumption of the ignorant public. Most leaders of the Indian
police at heart desire continuation of the status quo at the peril of
the growth of the organisation so that they and their interests remain
undisturbed with unquestioning and dull-witted subordinates down the
ladder at their personal beck and call. Any indicia of threat to the
perceived security? Any brilliance of new concepts or interpretations
about the functioning of the police? Lo, most heads come together and
join hands in scrupleless cabals to undermine the source of brilliance.
The reason is self-interests. Nothing attract and bind them together so
fiercely as the possibility of new thoughts surfacing in the
organisation and somebody down the ladder leaving a trail of blaze of
brilliance that may cloud their organisational superiority.
What ensues is a fight jusqu au bout; it would be a fight sans moral or
legal scruples, a fight without a tinge of mercy or sympathy where all
fall as one against the lonely prey till it is neutralised.
Though courts of law can theoretically protect against such harassments,

expenses, time and uncertainties involved and the history of court
judgements being dodged or rendered ineffective by administrative
sleight, render the protection meaningless and force the upright officer
to face all humiliations and losses in silence or yield to the
pressures. It is to the credit of Indian police that it has great
officers who withstood all slights without yielding to pressures.
A distinct case is of a senior police officer and poet of outstanding

calibre and excellence from a southern state of India whose uprightness
cost him his career prospects. His disinclination towards flexible ways
made him unpopular among those higher in the hierarchical ladder. He was
though greatly feared and highly respected for his superior and
four-square qualities, most of those senior to him were uneasy at his
presence. Repeated attempts were made to discredit him and sully his
reputation by any means. Most senior police officers took him as a thorn
in their flesh and joined hands to tarnish his image. His creditable
works as a poet and reputation as a no-nonsense intellectual sperred
their manoeuvrability to achieve this end. They did what they could.
Unfounded abuses and lies were heaped upon him and recorded in his
annual confidential reports year after year. His appeals against the
reports were prevented from reaching government. He was year after year
denied decent postings. Mendacity was spread in words of mouth that he
could not manage responsible posts while actually he was never given a
change and tested in holding such a position. To top it all, he was
consistently denied promotion from 1990 for the next ten years and
scores of his mediocre juniors were brought over him in the career
ladder sinsyne. To add salt to the injury, his colleague thus given
promotion in 1990 was brought over him as his senior in 1995 just to
humiliate the upright officer. The officer withstood all these insults
in good stead because of his natural superior qualities, proven
reputation and the strength of personality. He refused the advice of
sympathetic superiors to approach the court of law against the
repression as there was no guarantee of redressal from the courts even
after a time-consuming legal battle. On the other hand, the accurst
police officer addressed the Chief Secretary of the state government in
1995 and explained the situation with a request to institute an enquiry
against him which if found him culpable of committing any major or minor
wrong at any time in his career or life or if anywhere found inefficient
in discharging his official duties, he could be removed from police
service. Even this extreme step failed to draw any response from the
government. When his superiors in unholy alliance found that none of
their customary methods work with him, they almost declared a war of
nerves on him in 1996. He was refused all normal benefits entitled to
his rank: his car was withdrawn, telephones were disconnected, his
personal staff was harassed subordinates were encouraged to disobey and
even access to office stationeries was denied. While even these measures
were not proved feracious in bringing the upright officer to heels and
instead the honest officer grew from strength to strength by his
distinguished and impregnable strength of personality, desperate as they
were, the senior officers, against all legal and administrative
proprieties, divested him of all his official powers he naturally
exercised virtuti officii in an effort to isolate the upright officer
tout ensemble. Such harassments are common when a few officers with
awakened conscience, honesty, professionalism and probity in public life
disturb the immoral indulgence of the corrupt lot in police and related
departments. Most consciences do breach, most professional competencies
crack and most concerns for probity in public life just disappear under
unrelenting pressures from above. Surviving such repressions as above is
only a rarest of the rare exceptions.
It is a tragedy in Indian police that there is no relation between the

efficiency and performance of an official and his standing in the
organisation. The police officials are so indifferent to the performance
of their subordinates and their work turnout that they are absolutely in
the dark about the standard of work turned out under their supervision.
Another reason for this sad affair may be that they are unqualified to
assess. This situation leads to random assessment when a senior is
statutorily bound to assess and in the process, talent withers and
opportunists overtake high-calibre workers on the hierarchical ladder.
A yardstick to measure an orgnaistion is the degree of success of the

organisation in meeting its raison d’etre. The responsibilities of the
police as an organisation basically is three fold, in that enforcing the
rule of law, assisting the judiciary in dispensation of justice and
functioning as the watchdog of the internal security of the country. The
three responsibilities do widely vary in their scope, functional
requirements and appropinquation that while the police function as law
enforcers while discharging law and order responsibilities, they may
sometimes be called to break laws though surreptitiously as the
watchdogs of the internal security of the country. Or while they
function only as a fact-finding machine to the judiciary, in enforcing
the rule of law in their capacity as the investigating authority, they
may be called to enforce laws as enforcers of law and order. In spite of
these wide variations in the nature of the works and responsibilities on
their bold shoulders, one thing that holds all works and
responsibilities of the police together is its importance as the spine
of the rule of law. The police is the cutting edge of the
administration. It is the watchdog of the administration. This scope of
the police often renders it to appear like the odd-job boy of the
statecraft. They, as ultima ratio, are the real dispenser of the rule of
law as well as the guardian angels of the country. This vital place in
the administration of the country, makes the police not only the arms,
legs, eyes, ears and noses of the administration, but the very tool of
the country’s well being and survival. The police is one of the most
important levers required in running the machinery of the statecraft. It
is why the blind rush and impatient race among rulers to control this
vital lever.
The reasons lie in the rulers as well as in the police. In the rulers
because it is natural for anyone to take advantage of the tools that
make itself available for use and rather preposterous to expect rulers
to shut their eyes while the police willingly offers itself for their
personal behoofs. And rulers of democratic India douse the police for
their personal and party ends to the extent that the first half century
after independence has obfuscated the distinction between the national
interests and the personal interests of the rulers as far as the use of
the police of democratic India elected to subordinate its professional
and national responsibilities to the gloria and being the handmaid of
the politicians in power. Two factors helped the process. One was the
wrong type of people at the helm of the organisation as models. Another
was the lack of proper understanding of the concepts like obedience and
discipline. These two factors together and seperately brought about
slowly but steadily the degringolade of professionalism in the police of
democratic India. The nonprofessional approach of the self seeking
police leadership at the helm to subserve the personal and party
interests of the rulers percolated downwards in the organisation as a
model and sadly accepted as the general rules of conduct by the maffled
police down below at all ranks per procurationem obedience and
discipline. The wrong model led Indian police to forget that their
primary obedience is to the laws of the country and rulers surface to
the front only as the representatives of the laws of the land and ergo
secondary to the sacred police responsibilities. The police in new
dispensation forgot the cardinal principle that they are subordinate to
the rulers faute de mieux and their profession dictates them to exercise
policing duties even against those rulers if the laws of the country
find them doing wrong. These serious professional lapses not only
weakend Indian police, also damaged political system, social values and
the credibility of Indian democratic process. Ignorance and lack of
interest is part of the Indian public in general and intellectual class
in particular in the police system and its time to time devious shifts
added to the malady in the form of giving free hand to the police to
evolve itself sans restraint and sound guidance.
Adaptations to political masters as a bargain to secure key posts prove
fatal to the dignity as well as professional values of the police setup.
A police officer of a state in southern India succeeded in cornering the
coveted post of Police Commissioner of the State Headquarters a few
years back by the support of politician known in the then political
parlance as the “ Father, Mother ‘ of the Chief Minister of the state. A
few days' afer, the politician in inebriated state was arrested with his
associates while fleeing in a car late night after involving in a sex
scandal involving a budding film star. The police official who affected
the arrest recognised the identity of the person he arrested only after
the arrested persons were brought to a nearby Police Station in the
city. The police Commissioner was intimated about the developments. The
Police Commissioner promptly made his appearance in the Police Station
in the night and ensured immediate release of his political godfather.
But, the political heavy weight in temulent state was impacable. He
caught the uniform collar of the Police Commissioner in front of the
shocked lowly officials of the Police Station and shouted at the Police
Commissioner in his inebriated voice whether he made him Police
Commissioner to arrest and bring him to the Police Station through his
juniors. The Police Commissioners was seen meekly begging the politician
to pardon him. The incident made headlines in newspapers. The Police
Commissioner later rose to become the Police Chief of the state and
retired now. Such incidents abound in circumstances of Police Officers
vying for coveted posts a tout prix and as a consequence, the dignity of
the posts lowers and the professional qualities of the organisation
suffer.
Present India do have an adequately large and sturdy framework for the
police apparatus in terms of organisational strength and budgetary
provisions to sustain it. Only the canvas held by the framework is
flabby and limicolous. This predicament per se speaks aplenty about the
very cause of it. For one, the fact that an adequately large and sturdy
framework or organisational strength and liberal budgetary provisions
available for the police setup is clear caract of the willing political
patronage to the apparatus; it sine dubio proves that the rulers
recognised the import of the police in running the administration.
However, the flabby and limicolous canvas ab intra speaks of the
nonprofessionalism under the sound political patronage. This adds up to
the close links between politics and the police for nonprofessional
purposes, possibly with criminal intent as nonprofessional police
approach mostly suggests criminal angle in view of the professional
police concerns mostly being focussed on crime control and crime
prevention. Unfortunately, India has passed a long way in this
undesirable links to the lengths of being cannot easily retract its path
to cleanse the augean stables of the police organisation now.
HUMANIZING THE POLICE

Though policing is a human service au fond, its methods often are
strikingly inhuman due to poor leadership and failure of police leaders
to tread pari passu with the requisites of man management and other
rightful policing techniques. The tragedy of the Indian police is that
its means and ends do not amate. The querimony that the feral methods of
the Indian police are more dreadful and antisocial than the criminal
acts they are supposed to control cannot be dismissed glibly as
inaccurate in prevailing circumstances. Out police system has grown to
be a monster deprived of any strains of humanism because of its
perennial exposure to inhuman methods of both the criminals and the
extant policing system. It is true that association moulds character.
The tenor of immunity obfuscates the strains of humanism in police. The
issue can be dealt on two fronts; adopting suitable measures in police
techniques to make it a more civilized operation and shaping the police
environment to make it sensitized to inhuman exposures. As the police
leaders themselves are victims of this infaust mould of mind, tremendous
organisational efforts are necessary to reinstate humanism in the
police. Should the police conform to the standards of humane comportment
and methods a la its desinent goals, policing would become a meaningful
and relevant service to the society.
The test of the police as a humanised organisation is its acceptance by

the societyas a couthie associate so that no child is scared of hearing
the name of a policeman and no illiterates take to their heels at the
mere sight of one. It is a wonder how people manage to accept the police
whom they perceive as an embodiment of bestiality, incivility and
inanity as guardians of their life, honour and property. Indian police
has cohabited long enough with its disrepute. A decision to furbish its
image as a humanised setup though late, is not intempestive as policing
is yet intact with its relevance to society though its inhuman methods
are fast eating up its credibility. Its leaders cannot afford any more
the exuberance of complacency if the police must stand up to its
expectations as the peace-keeper of society and assert to resile to its
deeper human strains. The process of showing the police its roots which
are obfuscated by the lounderings of time and its own working methods
must begin anon. The wherewithal of affecting the transformation is
varied and covers such disparate avenues as recruitment, training,
exposures, in-service role-play, environment, man management, policing
methods, criminals laws organisational pattern, living and working
conditions of the personnel, work pressures, self-image, public relation
techniques etc. A police leader should cover all these aspects in his
plan should he wish to see his police verily humanised.
Human aspect is the fulcrum of policing. Policing is primarily latitant

human interaction in the perennial luctation to safeguard the security
and rights of the common man and the human quality in the force
determines the effectiveness and vitality of the performance. Human
resources policy as a device of selecting human stuff needs careful
handling at the highest level to attract right people to the fold. The
present Indian environment of ruthless concours impleached with a
degringolade of values has made human resources management a farce in
India. The wherewithal of human resources management like recruitment,
promotions, transfers, rewards, punishments etc are no more employed for
maximum benefit of the organistion. Self-interests have undermined
quality and character and organisation interests are subordinated to
personal behoofs. Though this proclivity is prevalent in all fields of
present India, its adverse effects are kenspeckle in police as the
line-system of the organisation makes the ingenuity of the human
resources management a factor having direct and immediate bearing on the
efforts of humanising the police.
ORGANISATIONAL MEASURES
An earnest effort from the highest level to infuse the crème de la crème
characterised by genuine human stuff, probity and commitment is the
foremost need of the police. The prevalence of police administration
over general administration in the survival of a nation as a democratic
and orderly country necessitates changes in recruitment policy. This is
to ensure that only those with a deep natural humane disposition step
into the police so that the arrogance and savagery bred by the
environment do little harm to the public and the tenue of humanism
continues alongside policing work.
The chief cause of the police seldom being humane in Indian is its
ineffective training facilities. In spite of adequate infrastructures
available for police training in India, these centres largely fail to
offer quality training to humanise a recruit adequately to stand up-to
the challenges of the temulence of the arrogant and feral environment
that policing breeds. An overhaul of the extant training facilities in
terms of quality, content and character in favour of humanised policing
practices in inevitable to keep the police excubant against the
depravity of the modern society. There has to be a psychology faculty in
the centres to build character and strengthen human fibres. The training
centres should lay emphasis on attitudinal change in recruits and
develop the skill of humanised policing. The training centres should
give the impression to the public of being temples dedicated to
humanising the police apart from actually being so.
EXPOSURE TO LIFE OUTSIDE THE POLICE
The strenuous nature of policing hardens the police in spirit and mind .
A measure of creative activities like literary interactions, exposure to
poetry and fine arts, musical performances etc besprent in the precious
spare-time between policing hours intenerate the man behind the police
façade and resiles him to his natural human tendencies. Artistic
activities counterpoise the damage done to the man by the role-pay of
policing and open him up to the halcyon clime of the ideal and imaginary
world, far removed from the hard and brusque realities of the police
life and make his life richer. Exposure of the police to social service
activities acts as the celestial surgeon to enrace mellowness and
dignity to the police . Interaction with people from the plane of
oblation sinks the policeman from his inflated self to the roots of his
genuine feelings and concerns and conditions him to respond to the
vicissitudes of the environment. It opens up a new vista of feelings and
experiences that make life richer and meaningful au reste sensitisation
of the self. The social service activities as a form of servilitude to
mankind and a voluntary involvement with the people abserge the
temulence of power and abraid latitant human tendencies in the policeman
to bring to the surface his pristine self . It is left to the police
leaders to include social service schemes in their human resources
development programmes in an endeavour to humanise the police.
IMPORTANCE OF SELF-IMAGE
Rogers in “ On Becoming A Person”, says, “ The more fully the individual

is understood and accepted, the more he tends to drop the false fronts
with which he has been meeting life, and the more he tends to move in a
direction which is forward”. The conviction of fair treatment and
concern for human dignity in the policeman deeply affects his comport
beneath. An atmosphere of respect, dignity and fairness resiles his self
to its pristine charm of innocence and couthie disposition. On the other
hand, the strains of humiliation, contempt and scorn drive him to
catharize his frustrations and indignities on both those lower in the
hierarchy and the members of the public who come to his doors au
desespoir for redressal. The spite and the feral indiginities he
inflicts on those at his mercy would be pro rata to those he is
subjected to by his leaders. A policeman shabbily instated in his
organisation develops a poor self-image. Solley and Murphy analyse this
when they say” He perceives, responds, acts and communicates in terms of
his complex self-image leads to adjustment mechanisms”. A policeman,
proud of his self and work is created by respect to his individual
dignity that develops a confidence about humane strains subjacent in his
persona and dares him to betray the human responses that are so natural
to his entrails and makes the police environment in the country besprent
with the milk of human attributes like kindness, tenderness, elegance
and civility.
FACTORS OF ATTITUDINAL CHANGES
Motivation and deterrence are opposite facets of the same coin that pay
for attitudinal, change. Deterrence, although an extra force to the
system, is an effective wherewithal in materialising mobility in an
intended direction as an addendum to disparate motivation factors.
Efforts to humanise the police call for the apposite employment of
deterrence to inhumane acts by way of exemplary punishments. The
prevalence of means over the ends should be made the cardinal principle
of policing. The ends, however eximious they be, should not find
recognition by the police if the means adopted are mean and deplorable.
All inhuman acts by the police should be met with heavy punishments and
an atmosphere of social ostracisation of such elements should be created
in the force. The realisation that the police are ordinary people and no
criminal acts committed in discharge of official duties would extricate
them from the ensuing, liability should be made crystal clear. An
ingenerate sense of regard to people, oblivious of their locus standi in
the social ladder, can be generated in the police by instilling a mortal
fear of inhuman acts through exemplary punishments. The fact that
policing is a human service au fond does not justify adoption of feral
methods in policing. Adoption of violence and savagery by the police
gives legitimacy to such methods in the public eyes and thus weakens the
orderly fabric of the society. Violent methods like employment of third
degree in interrogation to obtain quick results in preference to the
tedium of swink’t investigation weaken the image of the police already
weighed under by pressures of work.
ADOPTION OF SCIENTIFIC TECHNIQUES
Adoption of scientific techniques in policing helps in humanising the

police. It saves the police from the antilogy of committing criminal
acts to meet the ends of justice. All efforts to humanise the police
prove infructuous until the police continues to be at the mercy of
violent methods for results. A genuine effort at humanising the police
should begin with methods to instil sophistication and accuracy in
policing. Old habits die hard. Vigorous efforts to mundify old nasty
habits should find priority as a substruction on which the edifice of
the efforts of humanising the police should be built.
CONTRIBUTION OF CRIMINAL LAWS
A few glaring anomalies and erroneous provisions of the extant criminal

laws in India contributed to the easy fredaine of criminals from the
clutches of the law in many cases and the harassment of innocent persons
by the police in some other cases. The loopholes in the criminal laws
have to be plugged if crime administration is to be humanised and
command a semblance of public respect and confidence. Intelligent
adaptations in the extant criminal laws to interdict inhuman policing
methods and provide wherewithals for facile crime administration are the
needs of the hour. The policeman or the judicial officer under whose
custody a person is kept under detention must be made responsible by
name for the timely release of the detenue with the provision that if
detention exceeds the period provided by law, the concerned officer is
liable for proceedings for the unlawful detention sans the privilege of
exemptions for acts performed in official colour. Also, all cases of
violence and physical outrage committed in police custody should be made
punishable with exemplary penalties by special legislations. Such outre
measures may bring an end to shocking inhumane acts committed in the
similitude of policing in some quarters and save the Indian police from
acute public resentment. All discretions with police and judiciary
regarding bail should be taken away with only a select few offences of
enormous gravity made nonbailable. This will restrict both the police
and the judiciary from showing favours to some criminals en revanche to
favours and bring mechanical accuracy to bail provisions. This measure
may be found a path-breaker in preventing the misuse of criminal laws
and the inhuman play of favours to some and disfavours to others among
the criminals.
IMPACT OF SOCIAL LEGISLATIONS
The propensity of weighing the police with the responsibility of

enforcemetn of all types of legislations has become a major hazard to
effective policing. It is emphatically so with social legislations which
pass out of our legislative homes sans cohibition. These progressive
measures are inherently controversial in nature and their enforcement by
the police weakens its credibility as an agency of serious business and
peremptory order. It is plauditory to conceive of the police as a
vehicle of progressive measures. In the process, however, the police, is
certain to put both its credibility and professionalism in jeopardy as
these social legislations lack the depth and gravity required to enforce
them and brings an aura of commitment to certain sections of the society
or people against the universal image enjoyed by the police as a
profession. Assiduous enforcement may be perceived as inhuman acts of
high-handedness and harassment of certain section of the society. It is
not in the interests of the process of humanising the police to expose
it to civil contecks. The exclusion of social legislations from the
ambit of normal police work will save the police organisation from the
embarrassment of handling issues for which it is not equipped either
mentally or professionally or organisationally. This measure will exeme
the police organisation from unwarranted pressures that add to the
dehumanisation process also enhances its legitimacy as the guardian of
the order and security of the human interests.
IMPORTANCE OF PUBLIC RELATIONS
Though efforts are en train to ameliorate the image of the Indian

police, nothing substantial could be achieved due to amateurish
handling. The present Indian police managers have their image
development wherewithal limited to issuing occasional press statement
while image development has become a highly advanced field of
specialisation with perennial scope for further advancements. In view of
the considerable significance of the image for successful police
operations, the wherewithal of image building in the police is required
to be updated with the latest techniques applied by professionals in the
field. It does not suffice if the police is humanised; the police also
should appear humanised. While public relations professionals can handle
the job from the organisational level, an insight to the police about
the rudiments of public relations is sine qua non if it is to appear
humanised to the public eyes. This necessitates the exposure of the
police to the latest public relations techniques at regular intervals to
imbibe the skill of civility in interacting with the public.
IN-SERVICE IMAGE AND ROLEPLAY
The proclivity for role –play is a major driving force in the process of
motivation. People who enter a new setup, look to their new environment
for the role they should assume and the setup tenders them homo coloris
in conformity to its own image. People joining a humanised organisation
play the role of humaneness to fulfil their esurient urge to identify
with the setup. The in-service image of an organisation is a powerful
springboard that sets it to actuate that image. An in-service image as a
humane setup is de rigueur if humanising the police is to grow as a
tradition. The very reputation of the police as a humane setup limits
the options of the insiders against acting antilogous to its reputation
and thus exert an invied pressure to rise to the expectations of the
organisation that owns them. The process of building a humanised image
ab intra requires the assistance of skeely image-building technicians
and adroit operations by police leaders. This forms the desinent and
vital stage in humanising the police.
Humanistic propensions in a hierarchical setup like the police should

permeate from above should the organisation be humanised and its
power-strata identify it with their organisational self. The police
leaders should set standards of human comportmetn for others in the
organisation to make it the substruction of organisational behaviour.
Policing is an exercise revolving around the fulcrum of humanism while
humanism is the foundation on which the edifice of policing should
stand. Policing is a crime sans human concerns to support it. The
infaust polarisation of dulcet human propensities from nefandous
policing activities in the present police setup is a serious
organisational malady that renders the very policing system of India
counter-productive and as a perpetuator of the licensed crimes. Policing
powers are a trust invested in the police for exercise in the general
interests of the people. The police loses all its claims to power, the
moment it sinks its concerns for people and its policing activities
become a depravity, pure and clear.
THE ROLE OF POLICE IN A DEMOCRACY

Democracy stands for popular rule. Popular rule implies mass involvement
of people in the political process. Mass involvement of people
necessitates rules and laws and an agency to enforce it. Here lies the
relevance of police in a democracy.
The seed of democracy is self-discipline. It involves responsibility to

the interests of the country and identifies self-interests with the
national interest. In this sense, every person is police for himself in
a democracy. This being only an ideal situation, field realities
necessitate an external agency per procurationem of the government to
enforce rules and laws and police the national interests from the
assaults of parochial and anti-social interests lurking in shadows of a
democratic rule. This is the police of a democracy.
Police is a double-edged sword. Its front is national interests and

safety and security of the national life. Its one edge accounts for
policing of the people; the other, for policing the process of
governance. Though the two functions towards the well-being of the
country appear intrenchant prima facie, they do make significant
difference in the actual process of policing. In one, police police the
ruled from the side of the government. In the other, police police the
rules from the side of the people as true power-wielders. While in one,
it is the will of the rulers that prevails in driving the police to
police, in the other, it is the will of the people as expressed through
the public media, bind the police to police in a particular way. Police
in a democracy are no more than a system driven by the pulls and
counterpulls of the government and the public opinion in one hand, and
the laws in force and the safety and security of the national life on
the other. For the infaust police, the diverse contradictory pulls and
pressures only multiply with the ascensive complexity of the national
life. This situation of policing in a democracy makes policing an
infinitely more difficult task than otherwise by forcing police to make
decisions and take sides. This may be an opportunity for better service
in the circumstances of true professional work. It turns to grave
mess-up in absence of professionalism probity and genuine national
interests.
The key of policing in a democracy is sensitivity; sensitivity to the

needs of the society and the nation. Policing in a democracy involves
keeping eyes ears and even olfactory organs open with an argute faculty
of conceptualisation to understand the fast changing dynamics neath the
frontal layers of the society and an ability for fast responses to
handle emergent situations. No society is static. Changes are repaid in
a democratic atmosphere with group interests in constant conflict. The
kaleidoscope of changing faces of the society is best accounted by the
media in diverse forms. Though government is expected to be alert to the
needs of the society, factors like inefficiency and corruption more
often than not work against social vectors and lead against social
sensibilities. Policing under such a government hardly fulfil the needs
of the national well-being. An avizefull police can always comprehend
the complexity of situation through media and judge the right course of
action on its own wisdom. However, media in a democratic ambience is not
infallible. Public opinion is more an artificially created venal
commodity than a natural phenomenon in a democracy. Media has become a
hi-tech business in the age of power through elections. Most tools of
creating and arousing public opinion are instruments of propaganda. In
the circumstances, blindly relying on opinions artificially trumped-up
by the media may not lead police anywhere. Rather, it may mislead police
in its pursuit of justice and well-being of the country. Ergo, perpetual
pernoctation is the watch-word of a democratic police while being
sensitive to the needs of the government au reste the ripples of the
public opinion with the national interests and its well-being as the
litmus test.
Police is the ultimate weapon of the rule of law in a democracy.

Government, laws and police form a holy trinity in a democracy and each
is sine qua non for the other two in the system. The fact is that laws
are mutable. They are enacted to meet the challenges of the society from
time to time. Laws are collective responses of the legislators to a
given situation. Chances are that laws in force are not adequate to
handle extant challenges in the field. It is a serious problem, police
face. Policing is not exactly like a football game wherein rules of the
game are paramound and goals are scored selon les regles. Laws are sine
dubio paramount. Equally paramount is the safety and security of the
national life. Here lies the dilemma of the police. When the two
paramount objects refuse to go pari passu, police find themselves in the
precarious position of making a choice between the two as in national
security decisions. Laws have to be broken in the larger interests of
the country while national interests cannot wait for the enactment of
requisite laws. The situation leads to human rights violations and
popular condemnation of police in some cases. Police have to bear the
humiliation with dignity in the interests of their professional
objectives. The pith of the issue is that what constitutes national
interests and what not, and how far police to be trusted in deciding
where they can be given leeway to break laws in the presumed interests
of the safety and security of the national life. Even while laws provide
for action, laws only speak what to do; it is left to police how to do
and how much to do. In the polluted atmosphere of criminalisation of
politics and the politicisation of police, neither the police nor the
political leadership as the highest layer of governance in a democracy
is worthy of a trust of such a magnitude. The need is a sensitive
balance between the laws in force and the safety and security of the
national life. Police in a democracy need to be perpetually alert to
both the needs and find an aurea mediocritas to fine-tune its
professional objectives.
Police enjoy tremendous leeway in governance in a democracy. The only

limiting factor that works on its is pulls and counterpulls. The
contradictory pulls and pressures are the clamour of the public for
professional and honest policing on the hand and the call of politicians
and bureaucrats steeped in personal interests for work as their
handmaids on the other. The cardinal issue is where the loyalty of
police should lie in the exercise of leeway in pursuit of professional
objectives in a democracy. Is it the convenience of the government or
the public interests? People in government claim that the first loyalty
of the police being to government is en regle. Their argument is based
on the position that police form a part of the government. Men and
officers of the police force are appointed by the government; they are
subject to conduct rules, administration and superintendence of the
government. The other side claims that the police are responsible only
to the laws in force and for nothing else. Such a commitment by police
is the foundation of the administration of justice. This is the
situation even in England from where India adopted the gestalt of its
democratic system. In the famous Blackburn case in England, Lord Denning
in reference to police, pronounced “,… is not the servant of anyone,
save of the law itself. No minister of the crown can tell him that the
must or must not keep observation on this place or that; or that he must
or must not prosecute this man or that one. Nor can any police authority
tell him so. The responsibility for law enforcement lies on him. He is
answerable to the law and to the law alone”.
The responsibility of the police in a democracy is multifaceted. It must

guarantee justice and safety to all strata of people and ensure
equitable enforcement of law sine ira et studio. This implies special
care and protection to weaker sections en face exploitation from the
powerful and involves contranatant stimuli. This is where the sphere of
social laws comes to picture. Police has to paramount role in social
transformation in a democracy. Resistance is inherent and conflict is
inevitable in the world of changes. Group dynamics make conflicts
pronounced in a democracy. The role police play in social conflicts have
a major say in determining the futuristic pattern of society. The
importance necessitates police to be a thinker and a judge in addition
to being a cutting-edge executor. A thinking police is a special need of
a democracy. Laws only say what to do and what not to do; it is left to
police to decide how to do and how much to do. It decides where, when,
how and how much invokes what laws. Only a thinking police can handle
the responsibility perficiently. It has to deal with a variety of
situations of different points of time in enforcement of laws. Failure
cripples the evolution of social system to social justice.
A special feature of police in a democracy is involving people in

policing. People policing themselves is the leitmotiv of in involving
people in policing in a democracy. The regular police force is just a
skeleton for the true policing efforts of a democracy wherein every
citizen is a policeman of his country. The regular police force is just
a reticulation with necessary structure, resources and expertise at its
disposal towards that end. The potentiality of the citizens to police
themselves being fully exploited is an essential ingredient of a
successful democracy. No police orgnaisation can succeed in a democracy
without people being activity involved. The involvement can be either
formal or informal. In informal involvement, services of eligible
citizens are enlisted for policing under diverse categories of schemes
provided by police Acts like Special police Officers, Additional Police,
Traffic Wardens, Village Police or even Home Guards as provided by the
Home Guards enactments. The citizens so enlisted help the regular police
in various police duties with special rights and privileges under the
supervision and superintendence of the police force. The services are
normally voluntary. The skill of the regular police lies in making the
voluntary schemes attractive and popular and enlisting enthusiastic
citizens to its fold in large numbers. Not much is done in India in this
area. Nor real efforts are made to activate such voluntary schemes
provided by the law. The result is that Indian police sweat out without
a mass base in a maelstrom and bear impossible burdens on its weak frame
to the point of breaking down.
The informal involvement covers the use of citizens during the policing.
The help the citizens render to police varies from being informers,
witnesses and signatories to various panchanamas in criminal cases to
patrolling in groups in strife-stricken or dacoity-infested areas at
nights. These duties are principal to the success of policing. The skill
of the police in enlisting the cooperation of respectable citizens plays
an important role in making policing successful. Not much attention is
given to this skill in the present scheme of things in police. The
result is poor policing for lack of involvement of the people. Stock
witnesses are the order of the day. Willing cooperation of the public in
policing is a rarity. Police are more hated, feared and distanced than
respected and helped.
Involvement breeds a sense of belonging. It brings police and the public

closer. This is a major step towards the relevance of police in a
democracy. The sense of participation in policing helps to appreciate
the problems of the police and policing. It enthuses citizens to partake
in nation building and boosts patriotism.
The relevance of police in a democracy lies in the direct interaction

between the people and their police. Utility of police lies in its
usefulness to the people and the country. A two-way channel between the
people and the police makes a democracy really democratic. Periodical
meetings between the public and the police at various levels serve the
purpose. People from all walks of life of a specific area interact with
the police officers of the area in formal meetings held periodically on
policing issues. The exercise helps the public and the police know each
other better and appreciate mutual limitations in right perspective. It
makes better cooperation between the public and the police possible.
Informal contacts between the police and the public at different levels
also help the process. It boosts mutual confidence to the benefits of
both the sides and makes policing cost-effective and efficient The
interactions develop a sense of belonging between the two to the
advantage of both the sides as an essential ingredient of good policing
in a true democracy.
Policing in a true democracy can be extended to a wider scope of

experiment a la the Goa Police Bill, 1995. The bill modelled on
Singapore police, provides for creation of auxiliary police force by
owners of private establishments to safeguard life and property in
specified areas apart from being empowered to maintain law and order,
preserve public peace and prevent and detect crime within that area. The
auxilliary police force enjoys police powers and protections provided by
law on par with the regular police. It is a welcome experiment in India
in democratising the police of a democracy, provided every act of the
auxilliary police force is subjected to effective control, supervision
and superintendence of the regular police force to avoid misuse of
powers. The idea of people policing the people should not degenerate to
a situation where bigger fishes gorge the smaller ones or the fittest
only survive. Democracy is not a free-play of powers. It is a balanced
exercise of power wherein all people co-exist irrespective of whether
they are weak or powerful. Giving them policing powers to police
themselves is in line with the highest traditions of the democracy. In
the circumstances of the corrupt society, the vigil of the regular
police as the symbol of the state power is absolutely necessary to make
the auxilliary police force behave within the parameters of the law. The
same thing can be said about provisions in the Bill to punish
uncivilised conduct like spitting, smoking, urinating, throwing garbage
etc in public places. They are bound to be appreciated in an enlightened
democracy as a measure of cleansing their cities and inculcating decent
and healthy practices among them while in an unelightened democracy like
India, there is bound to be opposition to the provisions as an intrusion
on their right of doing what they want and irresponsible and
sensation-mongering Indian media is bound to linger on the protests as
an event of national significance. Both sides are the part of the
democratic interplay of a democracy.
The options before the police in a democracy are often a bundle of

nonoptions. They find themselves in the precarious situation of neither
taking a decision nor avoiding it. It is like being caught between the
devil and the deep sea. Democracy lets loose contradictory forces to
pounce on police from all sides. A police not steeped in professional
resolve gets seized in the melee and exposes itself to grievous errors.
A good example is the case of dreaded underworld don Arun Gawli of
Mumbai. The world knows that he is a dangerous criminal with scores of
criminal cases pending against him. Mumbai police obviously is helpless
in containing his criminal activities. Large sections of the people in
Dagdi Chawi, Mumbai and Maharastra idolise and support the criminal.
Democracy dictates respect to the feelings and sensitivities of all
sections of the society. Shiva Sena supremo Bal Thackeray and his party
called him as their answer to dreaded underworld don Dawood Ibrahim and
tried to promote him and his gangsters. He become a respected figure to
Mumbai police under Shiva Sena Chief Minister, once he established his
Akhila Bharatiya Sena (ABS) at Mumbai and other places of Maharastra, he
fell foul with Shiva Sena and its supremo and political parties like
congress tried to woo him and his muscle of labour orgnisations to their
fold. Then Mubai police under Shiva Sena government realised that Arun
Gawli and his criminal activities are security threat to the nation and
he was arrested and detained under NSA for a couple of exttortion cases
and harbouring criminals. Nagapur Bench of Mumbai High Court declared
the arrest and detention under NSA as illegal. The episode explains all
the maladies of policing in a democracy in the ambience of
criminsalisation of politics, politicisation of police, lax judicia
system, constricting group dynamics and the ability of criminal elements
to take advantage of the Achilles’ heel of a system. A flexible police
is the centre of all these malaises.
People, their group interests and concomitant conflicts are centrestage

in a democracy. Police are caught in the web of the dynamics of a
democracy. In a situation where government and power depend upon the
vote banks of groups, the task of police weaving through these groups to
police them and bring wrong-doers to book pro bono publico is an
unenviable task demanding tact. In the notorious Shivani acid attack
case of Jaipur, a 17 year-old girl, Shivani Jadeja on way to school from
her residence on April 12, 1997 was attacked with acid, allegedly by the
son of the transport minister of the state and his friends; the state
police turned impervious to the statement of the victim, recorded by
them and her letter addressed to the Jaipur Superintendent of Police
about the involvement of the minister’s son in the offence. Even public
protests and agitations by women’s groups and the interest of the media
in the case failed to deter the state police from its inaction against
the actual offenders. Even the state police chief gave evasive answers
to the media about action against the offenders named by Shivani. This
is the quantum of political pressure on policing. It was only after two
representations from socially concious organisations being treated as
Public Interest Litigations that Rajastan High Court directed the state
government to withdraw the case from the state police and get the
investigation done by the CBI. This is the extent of the credibility of
the police under political pressure. Police just cannot do justice to
justice under the extant democratic pulls and pressures. Every interest
group in a democracy is powerful with scores of followers. Police by the
very nature of their work cannot please every side and therefore bound
to work in an atmosphere of hatred and inimical feelings. In group
dynamics of Indian kind, law, justice and propriety make little sense.
Even criminals form a pollent group of considerable political

manoeuvrability and strength in a democracy. Any move against the
interests of this group is bound to create serious problems to police. A
police officer with a commitment to crush crime syndicates and their
criminal activities on coming to power meets with dramatic rise in
crimes and law and order problems in his area to the extent that he soon
realise that he has no alternative to keep the underworld on right side
were he to save his professional reputation, his new position and peace
in his area. A few fools who fail to read the writings on the wall, get
thrown out of their post and avoid any responsible job thereafter on the
charge of being incapable of controlling crimes and maintaining law and
order. Cooperation of the powerful criminal groups is conditio sine qua
non for smooth policing a democracy. The recent example is a state
capital in India. Its new Police Commissioner adopted a soft approach to
powerful mafia gangs of the city and shut eyes to the flourishing
business of cabaret, live bands and night-clubs. The result was a
relatively crime-free tenure for him in the city. But, he rubbed the
media on the wrong side on the first day of his taking charge in the
city. As a consequence, he had to bear an unfavourable media throughout.
The next Police Commissioner of the city was after stopping the menace
of cabaret, live bands and night clubs and containing organised crimes
in the city. The immediate response to the new Police Commissioner was
inordinate rise in crimes like chain-snatching , kidnapping, extoration,
gang war, house-breaking and dacoity and law and order disturbances. It
was the crime syndicates sending signals to come to terms with their
existence and activities. The political pressures the underworld weilds
au reste the warning shots are capable of bringing a practical police
officer to his senses. He is forced to compromise his convictions to
retain his position. This is how police is under seize in a democracy.
Police derive strength byadhering to law and justice. Once off the track
to aggrace political masters. Thus develops a vicious circle that leads
police to be perpetually under the beck and call of the politicians in
power. The beginning of the collision of politicians and the police in a
democracy is always for mutual benefits.
Police is a democracy’s spine, its conditio sine qua non. It is an

instrument of containment in the ambience of narrow interests
trespassing on each other’s interest. Success of a democracy entirely
depends on the effectiveness of the police there. It is the only
instrument available to bring people to their senses and to the needs of
the laws. It is unlike other forms of government, wherein other forms
are created to bring the people to submission to the will of the rulers.
Private armies in whatever name sans the leash of law, operate as
executors of the will of the rulers in nondemocracies. Indian police
these days with its deep politicisation is gradually approximating to
the sad state. Mass transfer of police officers at all levels with the
change of government, use of intelligence units for political
manoeuvrings, use of investigating agencies to keep political rivals in
check etc are just the signs on the surface of this tragic malady. The
slant is not in the interests of democracy, for, the strength of
democracy is pra rata to the professional resolve of the police. A
weakened and ineffective police is a sure sign of crumbling democracy. A
democracy just cannot stand up without the spine of the police,
especially while people are yet to realise their democratic
responsibilities. Strengthening the police is the foremost need of
firming up democratic traditions. How soon India realises this, so much
good for the country.
THE GUN STILL SPEAKS

Complacency and loopholes in the security system have
contributed to giving terrorism in Punjab a fresh lease of
of life, writes Praveen Kumar.
The complacency over peace in Punjab was shattered by the bomb blast
that killed Punjab chief minister Beant Singh in front of the Punjab and
Haryana secretariat building at Chandigarh on August 31, 1995. The
assassination vindicated the axiom that superficial calm in a situation
of serious conflict can be deceptive.
Complacency on the part of the general public is understandable;

complacency even on part of ordinary government functionaries can be
accepted. But how authorities responsible for security functions ignored
the prime tenets of internal security, and slackened their guard in
respect of Punjab terrorism is something difficult to answer.
Firstly, it is unreasonable to presume that the blaze of terrorism which

raised its head with the Akali-Nirankari clash of April 13, 1978,
reached its crescendo in 1985 and continued with undiminished vigour
upto 1992, died down immediately after an elected government came to
power. A bomb blast near the Indian Youth Congress office in Delhi on
September 11,1993 killed eight persons though Youth Congress president
M.S.Bitta survived the attempt and the son of Ram Niwas Mirdha was
kidnapped by the Khalistan Liberation Force.
A minor blast in a car in proximity to chief minister Beant Singh near

Dholewas Chowk in Ludhiana, the hub of previous terrorist activities,
preceded the more daring venture. Thirdly it is rather foolish to
believe that a movement which dug deep roots in countries like Pakistan,
the USA, the UK and Canada through committed cadres withered away just
because an elected government was restored, or militants were
overpowered.
It was often claimed by political observers that terrorism in Punjab in

general and the activities of the Babbar Khalsa International in
particular came to a virtual end with the death of Babbar Khalsa leader,
Sukhdev Singh Babbar, after being caught at patiala in August 1992 Such
assessments are far from ground realities.
No militancy having deep roots depends for its survival on a few

leaders, the fear of the government or the resolution of minor issues.
Such developments may only bring about an ephemeral lull in their
activities. It is simplistic to presume that transfer of Chandigarh to
Punjab and settlement of water and territorial disputes of Punjab with
Haryana and Rajasthan would have banished militancy. Terrorism has its
own cycles of rise and fall, before it finally withers away with a loss
in emotional fervour.
A lull in militancy for a few months or years should not lead to

conclusion that terrorism is out. Ironically, Beant Singh as chief
minister knew this better than anybody. He often spoke about the
continued threat of militants and called for a joint security zone to
fight them.
The fact remains that there was no social base to militancy in Punjab
even at the best of times. The close family links of Sikhs and Hindus
with often both religions coexisting in a single home and family render
the demand for Khalistan rather unrealistic and shallow. Issues like
Chandigarh and water and territorial disputes with neighbouring states
scarcely arouse the passions of the hoi polloi among Sikhs. Lives,
finance and peace having been shattered by 15 years of insurgency and
insecurity, they are keen to establish themselves in an atmosphere of
peace. The murders, extortions and rapes which the terrorists indulged
in rubbed off the sheen of martyrdom from their names.
There are reports of a working relationship of late among the militants

and their Pakistani masters. Sukhdev Sing Babbar confessed during
interrogation in 1992 to the toal disillusion of Sikh militants about
Pakistani intentions. The Inter-Services intelligence of Pakistanmet its
cul de sac in recruiting Sikhs after antiinsurgency operations were
strengthened in 1992. Most of the top terrorist leaders fled Punjab in
fear. Prominent leaders like Pritam Singh Sekhon of the Khalistan
Liberation Force, Wadhawa Singh of the Babbar Khalsa International and
Wassam Singh Zafarwal of the Khalistan Commando Force are still hiding
in Pakistan. Some other leaders operate from the USA, the UK or Canada.
Pakistan’s efforts to persuade Khalistani leaders hiding there to

resucitate terrorism in India failed badly. The ISI deputed Parmjit
Singh Panjwar of the Khalistan Commando Force to Punjab in 1994, to
recruit youths from Ludhiana and surrounding areas. The KCF leader made
no headway in his efforts. In a desperate bid, the ISI mobilised about
1,500 Sikh immigrants from Europe and trained them, but the immigrants
lacked the enthusiasm to carry out tasks in India at the behest of the
ISI.
This lull in terrorism cannot be presumed to be the end of terrorism,

which is the handiwork of a few activists who form a farthing part of
the local population. It is wrong to presume that these activities
represent the aspirations and fervour of the common people around them.
This silent majority becomes a hostage under inevitable pressures. Once,
the people of Punjab found that they were not under terrorist pressures,
they collected courage to express their disinclination towards
terrorism. It is a blunder to interpret this disinclination as signs of
terrorism being uprooted from Punjab.
To trained eyes, signs of terrorism lurking in shadows were already

there. There were no signs of Pakistan beating the retreat. Rather,
there was every indication of Pakistan going radical in rousing Sikh
passions. Virulent attacks of Pakistan’s government controlled
electronic media on the Indian government’s alleged repression of
minorities and popular movements, human rights violations and its
efforts to rouse Sikh sensibilities by its programmes on Sikh traditions
and culture give evidence of Pakistan’s dishonest intentions.
The continued terrorism after restoration f popular government in 1992,

though in reduced frequency, should have lead those in charge of
anti-insurgency operations to conclude that terrorism was alive and may
come out of its shell.
Failures on the fronts of analysis, research and use of intelligence

also contributed to the complacency over Punjab. Indian security
agencies did intercept Sikh militants crossing the Indo-Pak border in
1994, and seized from them a document called ‘ Policy paper’ of Punjab
militants, wherein plans to resuscitate terrorism were laid down in
detail.
Intelligence agencies had information about plants to use human bombs to

eliminate those involved in the 1984 anti-Sikh riots and leaders like
Beant Singh and Bhajan Lal.
Sikh militants crossing over to India were arrested and subjected to

interrogation. Through this process, intelligence agencies should have
possessed vital information about the future of militancy. It is a
dismal commentary on anti-insurgency operations that Indian security
forces could derive no benefit from it.
Beant singh being perceived as extremely valuable to terrorist strikes,

was provided the highest grade of security cover available-‘Z plus’. His
security arrangements were next only to that of the Prime Minister.
It is a shocking commentary on the security system that chauffeurs of

such heavily protected personages as Beant Singh used to drive his
official cars to their houses for lunch. His security chief was
transferred out sans measures in advance to expose the incumbent chief
to existing security compulsions.
The new chief took charge of the post just the previous evening of the
assassination, after the post being vacant for a period, as the officer
originally transferred to the post was reluctant to hold charge and went
on leave.
These developments do not speak highly about administration in a

security apparatus. The very fact that the human bomb, a rank outsider
in a police constable’s uniform, could reach Beant Singh, speaks volumes
about what really our ‘ A plus’ security cover is.
Once terrorists strike, the police do make appreciable head-way in

investigating and detecting the case. Indian police always do it; they
did it in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case, the Indira Gandhi
assassination case and the Mahatma Gandhi assassination case. However,
good investigations cannot compensate the provision of adequate
protection.
POLICE AND HUMAN RIGHTS–DOES END

JUSTIFY MEANS?
A basic tool man devised to preserve his common rights is the police. It
is an irony that most incidents of human rights violations have their
roots in the police. This is an example of the fence grazing the crop.
The reasons are many. The most important lies in the police culture
itself-its inability to look beyond certain barriers it raises around
itself; its failure to see a human being as he; its incapacity to see
its relevance to the common man outside the power structure; its
inveterate indulgence with powerplay; its deviant interpretations of its
role in the rule of law and, above all, its scant respect for means (in
achieving the end) The result is the police siding with the wrong-doers
in the clashes between individual and national or other social
interests, leading to popular condemnation of the police.
Right thinking people are aware of the predicament and sufferings of

their fellow-men. Thanks to the revolution in the communication sphere,
human rights violations have become a highly sensitive issue, with the
human rights commissions at the regional, national and international
levels on their toes to detect, investigate, report and protest. The
factual reports have embarrassed Governments and their police outfits.
It is distressing to note that developing countries in Asia, Africa and
Latin America prominently figure in these reports; and the record of the
countries in the Indian sub-continent, including India, Pakistan and Sri
Lanka, is not inspiring either. India, in particular, must reread its
recent human rights record.
The basic question is whether human rights violation is sine qua non
with safeguarding national and the larger social interests. The second
is whether such violations are justified in the cause of such interests.
The third is what are the limits within which violations are confined,
and who imposes these limits and by what mechanism. What would be the
situation if the police who indulge in human rights violations to
protect national, and social interests are thoroughly corrupt, immoral
and unworthy of any trust? Answers are desperately needed.
India’s human rights record is particularly bad in Punjab and Kashmir.

Its record has never been satisfactory in the North –East or with the
naxalites.
Where does one draw the line between the larger interests of the country
and the violation of human rights? Blame is shifted from one level to
another whenever the police is pulled up for human rights violation
during action. The top brass blames the field officers for excess while
the latter blame the bosses for exerting pressures to show results
without any guidelines to protect human rights.
The truth is that the police, at all levels, and its administrators are
to be blamed, that none among the police and their administrators really
bother about human rights and their violations, least of all during
actions which expose them to tremendous risks. It is a do-or-die
situation. Once on a dangerous course of action, the sole aim of the
police is to succeed in the operation by whatever means. Moral questions
such as human rights violations and the public agitation likely to
follow do not matter, considering the dangers they face in carrying out
the task. It is a crisis and the tendency is to somehow overcome the
situation irrespective of what the future might hold. The administrators
know that excessive checks and moral fears blunt the killer instinct in
the policeman and affect the chance of his success in the field. The
authorities up the hierarchy also believe in succeeding somehow rather
than play by the rules. This is the crux of the matter regarding human
rights.
Human rights take precedence over national and social interests and
transcend religious and moral issues. Human rights become a sensitive
issue only when they clash inter se and invite a decision on basic
issues. The question is who is to judge such basic issues. Certainly the
decisions cannot be left to the whims and convenience of the police.
The human rights is the spine of policing must be made an integral part
of the police culture. This is absolutely necessary. Only such emphasis
restrain the police from indulging in violations.
NATURAL AND BASIC
Human rights are the natural rights of the human race as well as the
laws that help make social life possible. This gives a legal slant to
the issue. The legislature, in a democracy, decides how much of such
rights could be surrendered in common interest. The legislature by
promulgating laws and the courts by interpreting them delineate what
natural rights constitute inviolable human rights violations are an
issue between the legislature and the judiciary on the one hand and the
executive, which is the police, on the other. For the fear-struck
citizens, it is an issue between the helpless them and the arm-twisting
Government. In simple terms, human rights violations involve violating
the basic rights of life, liberty and human dignity beyond the limits of
the law. The violations may be committed in the acts of execution,
confinement or torture. It is basically the use of power beyond the
scope of law for certain ends and is not committed for any noble end.
Such violations are common in secret service operations; in emergent
situations, say, when separatists or terrorists are active or dangerous
operations of foreign agents are suspected.
The police indulge in human rights violations on suspected elements to

bring the situation under control either by eliminating them or by
forcing them to reveal their plans. Fake encounters were first contrived
and staged by the Indian Police. Crime investigations account for a
large share of human rights violations in the developing countries where
third degree methods are employed in the interrogation of the people
detained. Death, rape and torture in custody are common in many
developing countries.
Are acts of human rights violation effective in crime investigation or

in controlling a troubled situation? The answer is no. A temporary lull
may be created, but in the world of organised crime, the illegalities of
human rights violations have either no impact or have just the opposite
impact. The criminals are mentally and physically prepared to face any
threat to their basic rights. Devising alternative plans to counter
police action is only a minor diversion in their massive operations. In
fact, they enjoy fighting the Government on equal terms with no legal or
moral inhibitions. Their resolve to fight the Government with all the
resource at their disposal is only strengthened. It becomes a no-hold
barred fight then onwards, the law-enforcers losing their initial
advantages and the edge of civility and decency.
Inhuman and outrageous acts perpetrated by established Government

agencies have an electrifying impact on the common man whose sympathies
are in favour of the victims. The legal and moral relevances become
immaterial to the citizen. A well organised outfit actually contrives to
create a situation to earn the sympathy of the public.
HARDENED CRIMINALS
Another reason why acts of human rights violation will not put an end to
crimes is the criminals get hard and wish to take revenge and embarrass
the establishment. This is how resistance grows. This is what happened
in Punjab, in Kashmir and in Vietnam in the Sixties and the Seventies.
Another impact of the violation of human rights by the state is the loss
of fear and respect for the authority of the state. Once subjected to
third-degree methods during interrogation, a petty criminal comes out as
a hardened criminal. A government devoid of moral authority cannot rule
at all.
Secret services indulge in dirty tricks involving human rights violation

in national interests, though law and morality demand that such
violations in any form and for reason are bad. Criminals have their own
code of conduct. Secret service is a world apart and its dramatis
personae are inveterate in criminal games, with the official sanction to
play them. The danger lies in committing excesses that endanger the
safety and the well-being of innocent people not involved in the game in
any way. It is left to each state to draw the line depending on the
sensitivity of each problem though it cannot openly declare that it is
promoting and guiding the secret acts even remotely. Yet it is a
cardinal duty it must perform.
Another dimension of human rights violations is its commission for

personal ends in the garb of fighting a social cause. In the atmosphere
of violence, individuals from enforcement agencies as well as terrorist
outfits may take advantage of the situation and indulge in killings,
extortions and rape. India saw it happen in Punjab and Kashmir and even
in the North –East where personal scores wee settled.
The tragedy about Indian law –enforcers is that they are keen on the
immediate show of results to earn the appreciation of the higherups, in
the process relegating to the oblivion the need to find lasting
solutions. That is why the violation of human rights is on the rise as
efficient and ingenious policing is less preferred. This is true about
managing law and order issues as well as investigation of crimes.
Laws are formulated and promulgated by the government keeping in sight

the needs of the country and the responsibilities of its enforcing
machinery. The need to go lawless in order to enforce laws arises only
when the law-enforcers perceive that the laws are inadequate or their
abilities are inadequate to meet the challenges in the field. The laws
being what they are, framed from time to time, to suit the needs of the
field, the only conclusion one can draw from rampant human rights
violations is that the enforcers are utterly devoid of professional
skill and the instinct to do effective policing and hence resort to
lawlessness as a short-cut-method.
The heart of police responsibilities is protection of rights, be it
individual, corporate , organisational or social, or the rights of the
nation for survival. Protection, prevention and investigation are the
tools available for achieving these ends. Human rights make up the
essence of the privileges man enjoys in the social setup. The police,
entrusted with the responsibility of protecting rights, are doing a
disservice to the profession and humanity in violating human rights in
the discharge of peripheral duties.
But this is not unique to Indian police. The police and the governments
of almost all the developing countries suffer from the syndrome, the
problem being acute in non-democratic countries.
The problem is laying the emphasis on results irrespective of the means.

Committing an injustice in the name of justice cannot be called a
service in the cause of justice. In policing, each means is an end by
itself. Policing by its very nature, involves extreme measures such as
detention, arrest, search, seizure, impounding, forced entry, taking
possession, controlling movements and the use of weapons. These methods
when not employed discreetly and moderately, do great harm to
individuals and society. Perhaps in no other organisation is means as
vital as in the police.
IN DEFENCE OF JUDICIARY
Judiciary deals with and justice pertains to specifie cases and an
individual’s past, present and repute have nothing to do with justice
and judiciary, as for as it does not entail with the case under
adjudication to surface the truth. Judiciary, in its present system, can
not bother about a person’s history and other attributes as much as how
his particular act wronged an aggrieved party. Judging the judgement of
the judiciary extra muros of this scope is a great disservice to the
judiciary and the people whose right’s cardinal guardian is the
judiciary. After all, wrong committed is wrong whether it is committed
by a person of honesty and integrity or by a person sans the virtues.
The reason that a wrong is committed by a person of honesty and
integrity, does not abate the incisiveness of the injustice to the
wronged party. In the circumstances, berating judiciary for punishing a
person for committing a wrong, just because the person enjoys a good
reputation, is travesty of reasonableness. It is in fairness to presume
that the judiciary which is posted of all aspects of a disputed issue
for years, studied them in pro rata importance before pronouncing its
judgements in all its variance. Such a faith in judiciary is sine qua
non until myriad slip in part of the judiciary in major cases of
national importance disturb the national conscience at all strata to
prove, sine dubio, that the judiciary no more remains the cardinal
dispensor of justice. Taking judiciary to task in other circumstances on
the basis of punishment awarded to an individual or a blessed section of
the society for a proved wrong as the judiciary sees it or for the
quantum of punishment awarded as the judiciary sees it in its wisdom as
right vis a vis the injustices heaped upon the plebeian everyday in
India by various government bodies and civil servants sans an easy
recourse for justice and for that reason, accepted in mute suffering, is
height of unbalanced appropinquation in public affairs.
When judiciary, particularly the highest seat of judiciary in the

country, decides the quantum of punishment to be awarded for a wrong, it
keeps in mind the gravity of the wrong, mens rea, suffering undergone by
the petitioner, the message of the judiciary in the circumstances to the
public at large, dignity of the judiciary and the interests of the
nation and its people. Judiciary is a professional body to consider all
these aspects before passing its judgement. When so many aspects are in
stake, just the dignity of a privileged individual or section f society
cannot be a criterion for relaxing the quantum of punishment. Anybody
arguing against judicial pronouncement because of sympathy for a
privileged individual or section may not be doing his public service in
excelsis.
Often, judicial pronouncements are commented upon for using diverse

yardsticks in awarding the quantum of punishment for the same wrong at
different times. Such comments are based on wrong notion of judiciary as
a linear punishing apparatus. Judicial function at no time, even in
ancient India, was limited to the simplistic job of equating the quantum
of a wrong with the quantum of punishment. Indian judiciary was and in
its western heritage of present days is, always creative in its
dispensation of justice and takes causes and effects and overall
interests of the public in its administration of justice. It is in the
interest of the administration of justice and the system of government
to leave the matter at it with liberty to the judiciary to compute more
suo, the quantum of punishment to be awarded on its own wisdom rather
than shattering the public confidence on the judicial system with
comments based on clouded thinking.
Judiciary is blamed of activism. A change in the thinking of Indian

judiciary is patent these days. But, it is not activism. It is the
process of judiciary coming to its own. It is the process of Indian
judiciary abrading itself from its long gratuitous slumber, at last.
What we had was a dormant judiciary, pronouncements of which could be
easily ignored and ensuing contempt proceedings could be staved off by
obtaining an innocuous warning. In government circles, judicial
pronouncements had become a matter of choice. Even the lowest of the low
in government circles treated court orders with contempt.
In the process justice suffered. In the process hoi polloi whom the
judiciary has to protect from injustices heaped upon them by the mighty,
suffered. But, judiciary was complacent about its dormancy and
impervious to the sufferings of the wronged people. In government
circles, a situation has reached wherein it is generally accepted that
pleading with judiciary for justice against injustices in service
matters bring nothing more than waste of time and money, for, court
judgements at all levels of legislature-executive combine are
circumvented as a rule rather than as an exception and everybody knows
that no justice can be expedited by any court of law. It is a good tide
of events that the judiciary has awakened now. It started to see its
responsibilities to the common man more clearly and started to assert
selon les regles. The nation should have celebrated this change for
better rather than a few opinion leaders rousing public opinion against
judiciary for punishing some who treated judicial pronouncements with
scarce respect and ignored the commands of the rule of law to further
suffer wronged parties in pursuit of the deplorable tradition of
ignoring justices and fairness in administration.
An awakened judiciary has to break a new path to show that what was
happening to judicial pronouncements was not right. It has to choose a
time-may be yesterday or today to tomorrow or someday to do this. It
chose a day and acted to show the gravity and seriousness of its
judgements. In the circumstances, questioning the judiciary’s will on
the basis of why today, why not yesterday and why not tomorrow, is
rather preposterous, for such a change in the judiciary’s approach
either yesterday or tomorrow can be posed with the same doubts. And
certainly judiciary cannot continue with its sedentary responses for
contempt of its judgements for the fear of breaking the path of dormancy
of old times even after being awakened to its footle. None should fault
the judiciary for what it is doing.
Another question strikes about the bourasque roused while judiciary

punished somebody for committing wrong is why the same responses not
raised about those punished persons while consciously ignored doing
justice to wronged persons even on orders of the judiciary and tried to
perpetuate the sufferings of the wronged persons. Such disparities of
approach to sufferings of people do not go asey bien with public
interests.
Judiciary proceedings of modern days are based on perspicaciously

laid-down rules that give more than adequate scope for all the concerned
parties to explain, provide evidences and defend themselves before being
judged by the judiciary as responsible for wrongs. Any judicial
proceeding involves a petition of wrong committed, persons who allegedly
committed wrong and the judiciary to adjudicate the matter. Once
commission of a wrong is a res judicata, judiciary may be called to
judge who committed the wrong. On the strength of the facts and figures
provided to it by various parties. All the concerned parties are ad
libitum to show before the judiciary how and why they are not
responsible for the wrong indubitably committed. If somebody fail to
defend themselves to the satisfaction of the judiciary by parting
relevant information at their possession, even after judiciary, called
them to do as judicial procedure lays down, the people are doing so at
their own peril and responsible for the consequences of the judiciary’s
ultimate findings. The judiciary cannot be held responsible for the
glitches of the concerned parties at all. The concerned parties are free
to exercise their option either to own responsibility for the wrong
under issue or to show to the judiciary, under what circumstances they
were forced not to do full justice as judiciary thinks it had to, even
though such revelations put them and other concerned persons in
difficulties, judiciary cannot be blamed for passing orders against
persons who fail to come clean before it, even after being called to do
it.
What is called as activism in judiciary has come as a blessing to India.

The process may more appropriately be called as creative judiciary and
will certainly do a lot of good to India, its people, its judiciary and
its system of government. Rather than advocating sticking to the old
granny’s back, Indian opinion leaders including intellectuals, press and
electronic media must support judiciary to shed its lethargy and come
actively to perform its sacrosanct responsibility of reigning in
pandemic injustice in Indian society. It is a wonder that Indians are in
reverse gear while its judiciary rose to its constitutional
responsibility.
HOME GUARDS TRAINING

I am asked to write this article on a specific subject,
Home Guards Training. Rather than resorting to repititions
of what is already known and codified in Home Guards Manuals,
I venture here to touch upon the place of a holistic training
programme in Home Guards setup.
The backdrop of the voluntary nature and uncertain

tenure of service in the Home Guards necessiates its training
programmes to be capsuled in short-term courses, ranging from
five days to a month to avoid long absences of the volunteers
from their homes. The short-term nature of the training
underlines the need of repeated training courses in Home
Guards as a device of a stratified and stepped-up training
plan. A holistic training scheme needs to be programmed to
these short-term courses. I do not go here to the brasstacks
of a training programme in Home Guards for obvious reasons,
and restrict myself to the scope of the training programmes
to make it holistic and complete.
The two facts of a holistic training programme are

internal and external orientations, which in final analysis,
complement each other to creat a complete training programme.
INTERNAL ORIENTATION
Internal Orientation is the most neglected facet of a

training programme in the present world. The basic
configuration of internal orientation is founded on right
motivation, professional attitude and creation of a truly
committed persona. The voluntary nature of Home Guards
services renders the internal orientation more basic to
Home Guards Training rather than the other way round.
The ephemeral nature and uncertain tenure of the Home Guards
service necessiate a strong foundation of the internal
orientation to sustain interest in the service. Its absence
manifests in low turnout of volunteers when called for
service and poor performance. Unlike career services, there
is no adhesive of financial guarantee and perks, and job
security in Home Guards service to bind the volunteers
irrevocably to the Home Guards Service. The absence renders
the need of internal orientation all the more important in
Home Guards organisation. The need of internal!sat ion of
Maslow’s need hierarchy comes to play here as the internal
orientation spurs the need of internal!sat ion. Sans
internal orientation. Home Guards service is hollow, and
Home Guards service sans internal orientation is directionless,
Human nature being what it is, the spark of voluntary
service, once ignited, needs to be consistently stoked and
sustained to harness the maximum out of it. This need can
be met only by liberal dose of internal orientation in the
training programme. Home Guards can ignore the need only
at its own peril. The fact is that extant Home Guards
training programmes nowhere in India have internal orientation
incorporated in its agenda. This shortfall has arrested
the growth of Home Guards movement in India.
EXTERNAL ORIENTATION
Present Home Guards braining basically is external

orientation programmes. External Orientation is constituted.
of Knowledge Orientation and skill orientation. Present
training programmes identify knowledge orientation with
indoor classes and skill orientation with outdoor classes.
Here also training contents in both programmes in extant
Home Guards training are rather passe and do not meet the
operational needs in the field. The need of updating
training contents is largely forgotten. I round off this
discussion with the observation that the knowledge
orientation programmes in a purposeful training plan should
include topics like history of Home Guards, its organisational
structures, case studies of model operations, principles
of time and space management, basics of inter-person
relationship and courteous conduct in addition to what
is already there. And skill orientation programme in a
utility based training plan should cover latest researches
and tools of rescue operations including medical aid,
handling of computers and information technology gadgets,
driving, methods of identififation and defusing of
sophisticated bombs, basics of electric wirings in addition
to present topics. The skill oriented training programme
must create real skills unlike being an eye-wash as at
present, as the skill is meant to save lives and bring
order.Further, the skill oriented training programme in
Home Guards can be either physical or strategic in nature.
Physical skill needs are addressed by parade and physical
training. Strategic skills useful in Home Guards operations,
are addressed by outdoor demonstrations and rehearsals. The
strategic skills can be either managerial or operational in
nature. The managerial skill is required to address
organisational matters including planning, communication
transportation and control that are central to Home Guards
operations whij^e operational skill comes to force and
useful during actual operations.
INTERLINKED
The two facets of Home Guards Training, namely internal

and external orientations are not distinct and independent
entities, removed from each other. They are interlinked and
constitute a holistic training programme. An external
orientation like physical skill harnessed in the parade
ground positively contributes to reinforce the internal
orientation of a professional attitude like discipline.
Acquiring stratigic skills contribute to strengthen right
professional attitude and motivation. Similarly, the
knowledge of Home Guards history, its objectives and case
studies add to motivation towards Home Guards service.
Home Guards being an organisation of voluntary

service, there is a need of making its training programme
a pleasure-event to attract more and more volunteers to partake in the
programme.
It is training that differentiates a Home Guard from who is not.

Therefore, the success of Home Guard setup depends
on the success-story of its training programmes.
LAW AND JUSTICE

Justice begotten at a cost is justice lost. The fact is lost sight of by
present administration of justice. Justice necessitates an integral
vision. It cannot be isolated from its environment, past, present,
future, diverse issues, people involved and related events. It means
delving into the heart of an issue and delivering justice taking into
account all related issues and matters to the rightful entitlement of
all. This presupposes a passion for objectivity and justness and above
all, selflessness in the arbitrators of justice as well as in those who
are in the service of the administration of justice. The role of the
police in the administration of justice comes under scrutiny in the
context of their part in the investigation of crimes and maintenance of
law and order.
The police play umpteen roles as executors at the grassroots level. They
are basically performers, actual doers in the field. Passion is the
normal trait of action. Objectivity and justness seldom give company to
those who act to show results. Expecting selfless traits in policemen is
akin to waiting for rain drops to fall from bright white clouds. The
policemen perform their duties with normal flair and loyalty while put
in service of justice. Only they lean towards the rich and the powerful.
Loyalty to justice is a noble cause. It signifies a heightened mind

bound to a heightened cause. Loyalty to a value or a just cause is
always a great virtue. The same cannot be said about loyalty to
individuals of whatever importance. Individual loyalty in the service of
the administration of justice is self-defeating. The achilles’ heel lies
in loyalty, basically faith, a blind faith, sans stirrings in the
conscience. The only loyalty desirable for those in the service of the
administration of justice in addition to the loyalty to the cause of
justice and other virtues is loyalty to conscience, freedom of thought
and independent judgement. A policeman with his loyalty can do an
exemplary job in the administration of justice.
The police, as the cutting-edge of governance, enjoys enormous powers.

They can prevent, check, prohibit, restrain, regulate, confine or arrest
erring people. They can forcibly break-open, enter, search and seize
when the need arises. They may use weapons to hurt and kill. These
extraordinary powers are tools of the police in serving the interests of
justice. The police, as the means of justice, is exempted from the
process of justice by the law itself. The relevance of the police in the
administration of justice is two-fold: one, fair exercise of their
powers to ensure that no harm is done to the process of justice. There
is virtually no way to force them to comply with the needs of
objectivity and fairplay in work save their own interpretations of laws
and actions. Interference of the court often is to little, too late to
be meaningful. The lack of a sound mechanism of supervision and the poor
position of the policeman in society, mediocre education and a deviant
job culture inhibit the police from performing at levels commensurate
with their responsibilities. They have no organisational pride. Field
orientations distract them from high human values. A weak economic
position and opportunities to make easy money render them prone to
corrupt practices. There is nothing tangible in their service to inspire
a commitment to the noble cause.
Shallow policing is responsible for all the mishaps and turbulence of

the first half century of independent India. Another factor is the
exercise of their special powers without going against justice. The
police is a fence which, with its extra-ordinary powers, however, can
ruin the crop it is asked to protect. The enormous powers confer special
responsibilities on it to protect innocent people from a rash exercise
of powers.
Every person thinks he is right and every criminal is just in his own
assessment. Every act of a human being has its own logic, reasons and
justifications. This is true of the police too. Every encounter, every
lockup death, every third-degree method, every wrongful confinement,
every illegal arrest and every excess committed by the police has its
own justification. It is irrelevant how the justifications appear to
outsiders. You seldom find a policeman confessing to a wrong or an
excess committed. Commissioners have explained away the gunning down of
innocent citizens by subordinates in broad daylight as a case of
mistaken identity. We have any number of cases of senior police officers
colluding with subordinates in destroying evidence of lock-up death
cases.
The cause of failure of the police lies more in the system’s failure,
the character of its main players, deviant job culture and wrong
leadership than in the concept of policing. Police in an inappropriate
milieu may turn into a monster.
These days the executive heads of government opt for their own men in
the police force to head premier investigation agencies; political
rivals are investigated and charge-sheeted on flimsy grounds while cases
of national significance drag on. The police is reduced to the state of
a tool of political revenge in this power game. In the process, the
police loses its credibility as a nonpartisan player and an infallible
tool of establishing justice.
Making justice a costly affair gives another dimension to the issue.

Effectiveness of the police lies in its ability to make justice an
easily and cheaply dispensable commodity. The police is the first line
of defence. Courts come on the scene only in a far later stage. Most
cases of dispute never go beyond the police stations. Good police
certainly symbolises effective administration of justice more than
courts and prosecution department together do.
LAW AND ORDER POLICING IN INDIA

Amidst the diverse functions the police perform, the plebeian identifies
the police with maintenance of law and order. He sees the police in
uniform intervening the incidents of his everyday life beginning from a
simple street quarrel to mob violence. He sees them conducting raids on
vice dens and restricting his actions and movements in the name of
public interest. He sees their presence in well-nigh all state and
public gatherings, controlling crowd and maintaining order; in beats and
villages, checking history-sheeters. As a part of the law and order
staff, traffic police in white uniform are visible controlling and
regulating traffic during rush hours. The hoi polloi have learnt to see
the law and order police as their saviours in hours of need malgre
restrictions involved in the latter’s methods. As far as public deals
are concerned, help and support of the law and order police have become
sine qua non in the ambience of prolate fruad and unruly tendencies in
public life. Non obstante unvcivil methods and mouvais ton, ordinary
citizens consider the law and order police as a necessary evil and the
pith of the public order. It enjoys a special place in the psyche of the
people as a hated saviour and a constant compagnon in public life. The
image of law and order police decides to them the image of the police in
general. The law and order police steeped in corruption makes them
believe that the police force en semble smell rammish and its good
performances earn their unqualified plaudit to the entire force. The
strategic position of the law and order police in crime scene is patent
from the fact that it comes to picture right in time of a crime to
prevent its commission as the true strain of law and order policing
while other wings are involved either too early as in the case of
security police or too late as in the case of crime police. The
strategic timing brings them to the centre-stage of crime management in
the eyes of common people and wins them their trust and confidence.
Furthermore, the law and order police provide a rare praxis of symbion
with the law with each limiting and protecting the other unlike security
police ectogenic and crime police subservient to it. There cannot be
laws sans the law and order police and no law and order police sans the
laws. This is the ‘secret of the matchless relevance of the law and
order police to the orderly life of the country.
ABSENCE OF COMMON POLICY
Police stations are pillars of the law and order police reticulation
with district police offices in districts and police commissionerates in
major cities at regional levels and state police headquarters at
provincial levels beholden to the responsibility. Intermediary levels
like circles, subdivisions and ranges coordinate the work
interterritorial. Armed forces are maintained as reserves at regional
and state levels in addition at the centre to assist the law and order
police in highly disturbing situations. These are striking forces,
specially trained to handle serious lacunae of Indian law and order
police is that no special training facility is available for its staff
for actually dealing with the quotidian law and order issues. It is
rather crude to expect the police to depend on past experiences and
untrained personal faculties to meet professional law and order
challenges. The lapse leads to arbitrary handling of law and order
situations sans sound and uniform policy save peripheral measures to be
adopted before and during use of weapons and opening fire. The only help
available to an official on the field is the general guidelines of his
seniors who are equally illequipped to handle those situations. This
complicates situations during actual actions by depriving the elements
of mutual understanding among the police and the subjects as a natural
and essential factor of successful policing, and ipso factor creates
chaos. The situation can hardly be called as professional policing of
law and order. The uncertainties of each law and order issue added to
it, make handling of law and order in India, a pure maelstrom.
PULLS AND PRESSURES
Pulls and pressures are sine qua non in a democracy. Pressures of

influential and powerful blocs is an accepted phenomenon of the working
of a democratic government. This is patent in the working of Indian
police. Police as an agency that limits the liberty of the people pro
bono publico and discipline those who prevaricate, occupy a strategic
position in the interpersonal and public life of the citizens and makes
success and failure or life and death differences to them and their
ventures. The strategic position of the police is more pronounced in law
and order policing. Sadly law and order policing in India imprimis is
management of pulls and pressures in the wilderness of rules and laws.
Law and order policing has become a contrivement of bending and
interpreting rules and laws to the convenience of rich and powerful who
can pull strings at right places. This is an irony of democracy. These
prevarications go conspicuous in acts of political avatars and subject
the police to serve public censure. Otherwise, it is a mute affair as
the police algate are on the vocal side of the rich and influential
against dumb and helpless plebeian with none to fight the latter’s cause
against the risk of the wrath of the police save isolated cases of
courage and commitment. The situation is to the benefit of the police as
the shocks of possible disturbances by the prevarications are always
absorbed by the powerful on whose favour the police acted and the
interests of the police are safeguarded avec acharnement by them. This
is a tacit arrangement between the police and the powerful wherein the
police are really lower partners in the high-stake game played for the
benefits of the powerful bloc. The police with their little statute and
easy contentment, trade off their high powers to the mighty people for
the limited gains of the easy process of policing, career promotions,
peaceful life and and lucre. In the process, the police sacrifice the
sacred objectives of its profession.
UNDUE STRESS ON PLAYING SAFE
The current abracadabra of Indian police in managing law and order

issues is letting sleeping wolves sleep and avoid further troubles. Who
meet the requirement are hailed as the best law and order hands. Sine
dubio, management of law and order issues anywhere requires handling
situations without inviting gratuitous problems. But, the matter seems
overstretched in Indian ambience. Not ruffling feathers unnecessarily is
indubitably a priority. But, this should not be in shape of a
compromise, at the cost of law and justice, at the cost of professional
objectivity like in extant Indian law and order machinery which believes
in calm at all costs; those who are adequately insensate to go to that
length by placating powerful trouble-makers only win races for coveted
law and order posts in Indian ambience. The consequence of the apostasy
is that the law and order policing in India has become progressively a
nest of playing favouritism with utter contempt for professional
character. Those with a sense of objectivity and professional probity
self foot the bill as their professional uprightness falls foul with
powerful lobbies who in tune with the thoughts and fears of the higher
echelons of the law and order police, create troubles to those who dared
not to favour them. The sleight leads to a vicious circle that
perpetuates the wily interests of the powerful at the cost of weak and
dumb in the hands of the law and order police by hoisting corrupt and
lither elements in key law and order jobs. The conundrum is whether
being a part of such a vice system is as inevitable to the law and order
police as it appears. The answer definitely is in negative. An
understanding of the trickery en train in the system and a little
toughness and resolve to stand up to the challenges of the powerful
certainly help to solve the riddles. The real question is whether the
law and order police really want a solution to the riddles or is it
contented with what is there as its own making. All available data point
to the fact that the law and order police of India enjoy what is there
as its own making that provides them security and patronage.
INTOXICATING POWERS
Important responsibilities of the law and order police include

prevention of crimes, enforcement of laws, maintenance of public order,
controlling rowdy activities, checking the spread of vide dens,
regulating meetings, processions, and other activities in public places
in the interests of the maintenance or order, controlling crowds,
quelling mob violence etc. The police are invested with a spectrum of
powers which include powers to arrest, detain, search seize impound,
prosecute, levy collective fines, enter and take possession of private
places and buildings, use weapons to hurt and even kill to force
compliance etc. Most of these powers save in specified emergent
circumstances are circumscribed by the need of obtaining appropriate
magisterial orders for exercise. The maintenance of law and order in
large cities is facilitated by investing the magisterial powers with
police commissioners, often delegated upto the level of DCPs in charge
of law and order. The powers enjoyed by the law and order police amate
to their enormous responsibilities and perhaps rank first in range and
the width vis a vis other wings of the police setup. Unfortunately, the
importance and the width of powers of the law and order police per se
are its real bane. The dependence of the common man on this wing of the
police and the fear, the police inspire prompt him to gratiate the
police by all his means. The incessant rush of people on the doors of
the law and order police for patronage creates farthing power-centres at
lower levels, giving an image of feudal lords to the chiefs of police
stations who dare to preside over and pass judgements on small local
disputes irrespective of their relevances to maintenance of order and
other police duties. Marriages made in Police Stations are not uncommon
in states like Karnataka and Tamilnad. Favouritism abounds and rules and
laws are sidelined at will in these arbitrary arbitrations. This in
itself creates angry frustrations among wronged people and leads to
group rivalries and clashes. Thus the police are integrated as an
inseparable component of a deteriorating law and order situation.
TOOLS OF PATRONAGE
Powers enjoyed by the police to control and contain vice dens and rowdy
activities provide a new dimension to the importance and manoeuvrability
of the law and order police. Powers are two-sided weapons employed for
punishment as well as patronage. Human nature being what it is, the
police use its wide powers more as tools of patronage than as tools to
check rowdyism and vice dens in absence of professional commitment and
motivating factors to guide them on right lines. Organised crime
syndicates vie inter se for the favour and patronage of the police that
ensure the smooth sail of their anti-social activities and protection to
the gang. The gang that gains upper hand in the race rules the roast
till the key figures in the police responsible for the patronage remain
in power with the tacit understanding that the gang operatates within
certain limits to save the police from undue embarrassments plus a
subterranean arrangement to share the res gestae. The importance of the
police being what it is for the survival of these organised crime
syndicates, the importance of having right police officials in key
positions for these gangs cannot be overemphasised ; this leads to huge
amounts changing hands to ensure that particular police officials are
posted to particular law and order jobs. The end–result is happy and
secure crime syndicates in highly lucrative vice business under police
patronage at the cost of unassuming citizens and a contented and richer
law and order police running the show without a fluster of major law and
order scene. The hoi polloi too are contented because there are no major
disturbances and crimes with the underworld crime lords on the right
side of the police. Only they do not know how they are looted ab intra
and their unsuspecting character is taken advantage of and ravaged by
the conspiracy of criminals and criminal-baiters namely the law and
order police.
LACK OF CONCERTED DRIVE
Any shakeup in key positions of the law and order police leads to the
problems of maladjustment among the crime syndicates for superiority and
between the police and the crime world with gang-wars and ascensive
criminal activities creating real problems to the police. Once the
police come to terms with the crime gangs again, situation returns to
normalcy. Refusal by a four square official in a key law and order slot
to cooperate with crime syndicates invariably leads to further
disturbances till the official is either brought to heels or transferred
out to placate the disturbed powerful gang-lords. It is a rather triste
affaire of Indian police that the resolve or the killing instinct to go
tough with the crime syndicates that play the police by their little
fingers is just not present there. More distressing is how upright
officials who choose to fight powerful crime syndicates without yielding
to the temptations of easy and comfortable life feel isolated when
seriously let down and compromised by their own organisation by denying
support at the behests of the powerful crime lords on the mendacious
plea of maintaining peace. In a case more than a decade old, a young
Deputy Commissioner of Police in the port city of Calcutta in West
Bengal fell foul with a powerful crime syndicate operating from the port
area and patronised by a powerful politician in power in the state. He
was lured by the gang to pursue a criminal into the strongholds of the
gang in the port area; caught, horrendously tortured in captivity and
later lynched. Though criminal cases were registered later, nothing came
out of the case. This way a living lesson to upright police officers who
dare to take on powerful crime syndicates.
SIDING WITH THE PRIVILEGED
A major cause of law and order disturbances is the absence of

objectivity, fairness and sense of justice in the police in handling
important issues. The police tend to favour the rich and privileged few
in interpretation and exercise of powers to the disadvantage and outrage
of the weak and dumb majority. This in the long run, leads to resentment
and breeds resistance against the establishment and the system which
conspires to perpetuate the weak and unprivileged position by denying
just and legal dues. The lex non scripta of the police that whatever the
rich and powerful do is right convince the poor and disadvantaged that
the extant system is not for them. The situation prompts wronged people
to meet the system by its own coin by going rich and powerful by means
outside the system to force the system and its police crawl before their
riches and power for their pro-rich slant, en revanche. That is why the
ranks of rowdy gangs and organised crime syndicates surface almost
everyday in India to go rich and powerful at the earliest. They soon
learn that riches and powers have no laws and morality and the police
bought with it have no weaker legal and moral authority; that the police
patronage is pro rata to the riches they earn and share. The notorious
Chambal dacoits are the makings of the social evils and the police
patronage to its privileged perpetrators. The fact that Indian
electorate send ex-dacoits and criminals as their representatives so
state assemblies and parliament show the sympathies the criminals enjoy
with the people who are in touch with field situations and know how weak
and helpless people perforce run away from the society and go hors la
loi by the outrageous acts of rich and powerful with the police licking
boots at their feet and letting loose brutality on whoever dare to
oppose the feudal lords. This by no means is justification of lawless
life and meant only to show how police by their greed and irresponsible
handling of situations add to the growth of crime and lawlessness in the
society. Phoolan Devi and her associates from the Chambal valley and UP
and Bihar maifa gangs proved that criminality pays in India; it pays
wealth and fame as well as political power and love and respect of the
people. If there is a reason for this highly deplorable moral
degringolade in the country, it is the highly irresponsible and most
detestable handling of the law and order situation by its corrupt
police, which the hoi polloi find worse than the Chambal dacoits and
Bihar and UP mafia gangs.
POORLY ORGANISED
All said and analysed, the impact of Indian police on the management of
law and order scenario cannot be called satisfactory. The Indian
scenario is based on a few age-worn cliches devoid of professional
expertise, academic input and creative genius; the methods employed are
rude at best and arrogantly provocative at the worst. The whole range of
law and order management techniques of Indian police can be formulated
in a few crude catch-words like mediations or warnings followed by use
of force. Indian police have no in-build advantages of researches to
various types of law and order situations, psychological variables of
divergent law and order issues their social and political potentialities
and group dynamics, law-breaking tendencies and identification of and
communication with potential law –breakers, stratified use of police
powers at differential situations, application of latest psychological
techniques to field situations or rehabilitation vectors. Nor their
performances are up to the expectation in traditional contrivances like
effective use of weapons, strategies and tactics of operations and
techniques of mediation or warning. The riot control weapons used by
Indian law and order police are yet age-old lathi and tear-gas shells;
such common weapons like water jets and plastic bullets are beyond the
reach of police in most parts of India. Nor is there a perficient
machinery to gather information and intelligence pertaining to law and
order issues. The district and police station level machinery devised
for the purpose are illequipped for the enormous job because of their
limited size, resources, expertise and professional training. The law
and order police often depend on the state intelligence unit which with
a scope different from the local law and order needs, may fail the law
and order police. The intelligence failures of the law and order police
contributed for eruption and spread of law and order disturbances in
many instances. A striking recent example of such a failure of
intelligence is the Veerappan case wherein the combined forces of
Karnataka and Tamilnad police failed to humble and bring to book the
notorious forest brigand Veerappan who operates from the forests
bordering the two states. Though the operations by no means are easy,
the failure of the efforts for ten long years speak volumes about the
strengths and weaknesses of Indian law and order police.
The most precious aes triplex of a law and order police is its
professional honesty and commitment to the objectives of the profession.
The selflessness, impartiality and the sense of justness and fairness
bred from such a professional commitment endear the police to all
including its friends and foes. The trust and respect ensue from this,
take the police along way to success in its professional endeavour and
protect it from enormous professional hazards and risks common to the
job. Once this trust and respect are breached by immoral and illegal
slants in discharge of responsibilities lucri causa and other selfish
causes, the police are exposed to the wraths of the public and the
assaults of its foes and those crowds wronged by it. By prevarications,
the police are protecting neither their job interests nor the interest
of the country and its people; nor their personal interests are
protected as no gains made at risk to the life is worth the trouble.
Indian police seld book so long and open eyes to look around. Once they
stop to shed their professional arrogance and see the mine-fields
underfoot, they realise the bevue they commit and may pursue a path
befitting the diginity of their great profession.
LACKING VIGOUR
Crime investigations continue to be influenced by political
decisions in spite of periodical judicial reviews of investigation
process of important cases, says Praveen Kumar.
Independence half a century back marks the greatest turning point in the
history of Indian police. It marks the end of the 88-year history of
policing on modern lines under the Brithish Raj which began with the
enactment of the Madras District Police Act of 1859 and assumed
countrywide acceptance with the enactment of the Police Act of 1861.
Independence marks the beginning of the history of Indian police under
Indian hands in a democratic milieu unlike of yore though in form and
contents they were its continuation.
The hitch lay in its spirit, in the contradictions of the intentions of

a colonial police and the traditions of a democratic police. It patently
is against jus naturale to expect a colonial police transform to a
democratic set-up overnight with the awakening of the country at
midnight. Spirit is never known to be a quick-chameleonic, particularly
while form and contents maintain their stead. Change in spirit is the
natural outcome of changes in ambience leading to metamorphosis of value
system and attitudes by rapid exposures to changed trails and
tribulations to ripen the spirit to its new avatar. The first fifty
years of independence of India marks this period in context of the
spirit of Indian police maturing to democratic traditions in the hands
of Indian rulers.
Crime investigation is a task as important to police as national

security is. While national security gained currency in India after the
country became independent, crime investigation along with law and order
duties was the mainstay of Indian police from periods long before it.
But, India never realised the importance of crime investigation in
national affairs until very recently. Nonetheless, the Federal Bureau of
Investigation (FBI) of Mr.Edgar J Hoover in the US showed to the world
around the time of India’s independence, what a powerful instrument an
investigation agency can be in national affairs and how resourceful
chiefs of investigation agencies can hold even the heads of governments
of their countries to ransom.
PLAYING SAFE
It is to the credit of Indian Police that the primier investigation

agency of the country, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the
Criminal Investigation Department (CID) in states and union territories
never harboured such ambitions till now. It is a different matter that
in the recent years the CBI is forced by the judiciary to proceed
against ranking political leaders including former union cabinet
ministers and prime ministers, in discharge of its legitimate duties.
Otherwise, Indian investigation agencies, both at the Centre and in
regions, kept themselves away from interfering with the affairs of
political leaders and their kith and kin for most parts of the period in
the last fifty years, save dictated for limited actions by the ruling
parties for political purpose as in the Classic Computer case of 1993 in
Karnataka or cases against Ms. Indira Gandhi and her kin in 1977 for
emergency excesses. Otherwise, they believed in the sanctity of
political leaders and their associates as beyond the laws of the
country.
Criminal cases filed against those people invariably fell through for
lack of purposeful investigation and the trend led to the belief that
powerful people are beyond the reach of law. Recent judicial activism
changed the myth and infused a new vigour to the judicial and
law-enforcing systems of the country. But, an investigation agency doing
its legitimate duties under the pressures of the judiciary cannot be an
adequate compensation for doing the same works with a missionary zeal of
professional commitment. Indian investigation agencies at both the
national as well as regional levels are far from any professional zeal
and investigating skill seen in internationally acclaimed investigation
agencies like the Scotland Yard of England which provided the model for
the CBI and other regional investigation agencies of the country.
Sadly, Indian counterparts adopted only the form and not the spirit of
the Scotland Yard and thought it best in its indigenous wisdom not to
stir the hornet’s nest by going active and radical after the FBI of the
US
LACKLUSTRE PERFORMANCE
Recent developments in the national crime scene of India like the CBI
investigating top political leaders of the country for involvement in
various scandals of national importance has not changed the situation of
investigating agencies of India. Crime investigations continue to be a
factor of political decisions, in spite of periodical judicial reviews
of the investigation process
Investigation agencies enjoy tremendous leeway in carrying out

investigations in desired directions in spite of judicial scrutiny of
the cases. Until investigation agencies exhibit professional commitment
and develop a passion to deracinate evils from the society, exercises
like judicial reviews of the investigation process cannot really make
substantial differences, either to investigation agencies or to crime
investigations.
Unlike spirited investigations of corrupt leaders in countries like

Italy, Japan and Korea in the recent past, Indian investigation agencies
dither and drag their feet back to handle cases of political corruption
in spite of judicial compulsions on it. The professional and social
commitments seen in those countries are a far cry from Indian police of
the independent vintage. There seems to be no scope of Indian police
catching up with the spirit in near future if the first half century of
the democratic rule in India is any indication. Indian police leadership
is too steeped in slef-promotion to be bothered by the spirits pro bono
publico.
For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. This is true
in the field of Indian politics as well. It is significant that after
the Supreme Court of India took active interest in the investigation of
crimes involving top leaders of the country, a new trend has surfaced
with the post of the CBI chief being invested on somebody from the cadre
of the state from which the chief executive of the government hails, as
if to counter the pressures of the judiciary on the investigation
agency. This was true in 1993 and again in 1996.
The new trend only makes clear that everything is not well in the
administration of the investigation agencies of the country and
pressures and counter-pressures have a great say in the process of
investigations of those investigation agencies.
JUDICIAL ACTIVISM
The recent judicial activism in the investigation of important crimes

and scandals of India is not confined to the Supreme Court of India; nor
is it limited to the cases investigated by the CBI. High courts and even
session courts these days are taking lead from the Supreme Court, as
evident from the court proceedings in cases under trial in lower courts
like Lakhubhai Pathak cheating case involving an ex-prime minister,
anti- Sikh rioting case of 1984 and recent cases of harbouring notorious
mafia leaders involving prominent political leaders wherein the courts
have taken tough stands either in summoning top leaders for examination
or in refusing bails.
The judicial activism of the Supreme Court on the other hand is not
restricted only to the cases investigated by the CBI. In a recent case
of investigation of medial seat scandal involving prominent political
leaders in a state, the Supreme Court directed that the chief of the
state CID investigating the case should not be transferred out form the
CID without the permission of the court. The Investigation was
transferred to the CBI in 1996.
The basic issue is why judiciary should do the legitimate works of the
heads of investigation agencies in safeguarding the objectivity of the
investigation process. The very fact that there is the need of judicial
interference in the legitimate works of investigation agencies strongly
suggests that the investigation agencies are seriously ill. While
investigation agencies honestly and professionally discharge their
responsibilities towards fair investigations, no judiciary can even
afford to cross the sacred halls of their legitimate duties in violation
of the sensitivities of the investigation agencies and invite righteous
wrath of the public opinion. The investigation agencies and the public
are aware of the extant situation in investigation agencies and
therefore the interferences of the judiciary in investigations are not
only tolerated, but also welcomed by all sections of the people.
SYMPTOMS OF ATROPHY
The serious maladies witnessed in secret police and investigation

agencies of India are actually common symptoms of atrophy observed in
all wings of Indian police, including the law and order police.
Dishonesty, lack of professional commitment, extra-professional
loyalties and unchecked corruption are the albatross that commonly
affect the Indian police at all levels. It is not a rosy picture to have
of a police force which is more than a century old and is now reaching
half a century mark of existence in a free country.
The deterioration of Indian police is steep after independence. Perhaps,

democratic rule in the country has not done any good to Indian police.
The nexus of police with criminals and politicians is smothering and
squeezing the country and its public life out of its vitality to a stage
of paralysis. While this truth has been realised by people in states
like Bihar and UP it is eating up the vitals of the country in other
states too. The talk of private armies doing recent elections in UP and
Bihar is an indication of the confidence Indian police inspire in public
after fifty years of self-rule. Indian police in 1990s appears like a
century old giant tree rendered hollow by the termite of corruption.
Unless something is done fast to return the vitality of professional
pride and commitment, Indian police may irrevocably fail the country in
leading it forth to the century-mark of India’s independence.
KIDNAPPING FOR RANSOM

Kidnapping per se is a crime. Kidnapping itself as an end, as in a child
being kidnapped by either of the estranged parents of the child from the
custody of the other or a minor beloved being kidnapped by a lover, is a
crime known to man from the inception of social living. Kidnapping as a
means of other crimes as in forcing governments to release prominent
terrorist leaders in custody in exchange or for procuring other illegal
benefits is a more heinous form of the crime and often led to
cold-blooded murder of innocent people. The world-wide rise in the
incidence of kidnapping cases as a political tool in the international
crime scenario in 1970s is an important meith in the evolution of
kidnapping as a crime leverage. The next decade saw use of this tool by
mafioso and criminal gangs as a convenient means of extortion in India
in states like Bihar, UP, Delhi and Assam. The criminal virus is now
percolating to healthier parts of Indian. The means which was once
confined to criminal gangs of Bihar, UP and Delhi and to terrorist
outfits of North-East, Kashmir and Punjab regions as means of meeting
their respective criminal goals is now becoming an ambitious adventure
of resourceful street-hoodlums of big cities of India of making quick
easy money in oodles. The trend needs to be arrested quick and fast a
toute hasard.
SELECTION OF RIGHT TARGET
Most cases of Kidnapping for ransom are never made public nor reported
to police, Demands of the kidnappers are met posthaste and release of
victims is obtained. Reasons are many. Kidnappers who are after big
money and professionally operate, conduct more than adequate research
about their target to ensure that the target is not only capable of
meeting their demands, but also efficacious of coughing up them in
private to secure the safe release. Secondly, the strike is mostly
against people stacked with unaccounted money, who therefore dare not
public scrutiny of their ill-gotten riches and prefer private
settlement. The low credibility of the police in respect of its
competence and commitment in handling such sensitive cases adds to the
misease of the maledict victim. Added to this is the fear of being
forcibly led by the unenlightened police to commit insensitive acts that
may endanger of safety and security of the kidnapped persons.
UNEQUAL POLICE
In cases reported to police, the chance of kidnapped persons safely

returning home is tout court a matter of rare accident in the ambience
of present health of police competence in handling the cases. Public of
present health of police competence in handling the cases. Public
perception in this matter is accurate. The criminals are generally a
highly qualified and efficient group of committed people operating on
their own plans and convenience. Lots of thought, analyses and money go
to the plans, strategy and technique before acted upon. Hi-tech
facilities are employed to the best use. The success of police against
these tremendous odds in the absence of an elaborate strategy is a
matter of pure chance. Even in a chance detection, endless investigation
and trial generally end with equital in extant judicial system. Even in
the rarest of the rare convictions, punishment awarded at a distant
future nowhere amate to the promised fortunes of a successful kidnapping
case for ransom. The balance of advantage algate is patently is favour
of taking risk.
ROMANTIC IMAGE
In the age of high-money operation run through bank securities and other
banking channels, huge cash in hand is a rarity. This added to the
age-old stigma, makes conventional property offences like theft, HBT,
robbery and dacoity lean and nonglamorous crimes. On the other hand,
crimes like bank robbery, kidnapping for ransom and mega-fraud foot the
bill as glamorous crimes in the extant high-money world and yield
enormous grists unheard of in other crimes and make the criminals
instant heroes. The elaborate plans, strategies and efficiency involved
in the crime give an intellectual slant and bring the elements of
adventure and thrill to the whole affair. The romantic combination
prompts adventurous and ambitious unemployed youths in drones to take to
the crime.
CRIMINAL OUTFITS
Many criminals take to kidnapping for ransom as a means to sustain their
criminal outfits engaged in other major criminal activities. They kidnap
rich persons from the surroundings to meet their monetary besoin.
Notorious forest brigand, Veerappan, operating in forests bordering
Karnataka and Tamilnadu used to extort money from the owners of granite
mines in the areas of his operation. Any resistance was met with
kidnappings for ransom. This forced Karnataka Government to ban all
mining operation in the area. ULFA activities played the same trick in
Assam with tea estates. The arrest of top officials of Tata Tea Ltd. In
1977 on the charges of sedition inter alia for providing huge funds and
other services to banned ULFA terrorist outfit threw light on the going
on in Assam for years under the pall of the threat of kidnappings.
LURE OF QUICK MONEY
Other criminals take to kidnapping for ransom by the lure of the res
gestae of the crime and the easy money involved. These criminals with
importable lure for easy money spread like wildfire in Indian crime
scenario and pose threat to the fabric of safety and security of the
country. Ambitious and der-doing unemployed youths constitute the core
of this group of criminals. Unlimited riches around, unfulfilled besion,
own frustrations, the thrill of violence and the promise of belle vue
offered by criminal life as seen in television, cinema and cheap
literature together spur faex populi to make it big at a single sway by
taking kidnapping for ransom.
SCOPE FOR INGENUITY
The crime provides ample scope for the bluette of ingenuity. It allows
for immense freedom of action and strategies depending on the mental
calibre and material resources of the criminals. Right strategies,
efficient brasstacks and pernicketiness can make the crime a foolproof
operation. This is an inviting challenge to any resourceful and skeely
criminal. Use of hi-tech communication, transport and weaponry system
makes the crime a highly sophisticated operation. An elaborate and
hi-tech kidnapping operation for ransom involves huge money. In the
circumstances of de trop riches and plush targets capable of huge yields
as res gastae of a kidnap effort around, intelligent and enterprising
criminals take it as a good investment. Liberal spending in the stage of
reconnoitre is the hallmark of criminals resorting to this crime. They
hire safe-houses at posh areas at exorbitant rents, wear rich dresses
and move in luxurious cars while preparing for their strike. The
criminals in Nirmal Jaipuria kidnap case of Bangalore of 1977 who made a
ransom demand of Rs.5 crore, hired a house in Bangalore as the centre
for their operations at a rent of Rs.1.5 lakh a month for three months
prior to their strike. An investment of a few lakhs of rupees is more
than worth in an operation that promises to yield Rs.5 crore in a single
sweep.
SPREADING THE CRIMINAL VIRUS
The crime as isolated adventures for quick money in unorganised sector

poses the greatest thread to the peace and health of the country. The
youths in the crime seek their targets far away from their home state to
avoid detection and other embarrassments. This is how youths of Delhi,
Punjab and UP are found operating in a southern city like Bangalore. The
process helps the spread of the criminal virus of a crime-infested
region to healthier regions of the country. Medical and engineering
colleges that offer seats to the sons of crime tainted and
black-money-plush parents on the strength of donations help the spread
of crime tendencies to other parts of the country. This is how the crime
culture of UP and Bihar is spreading to relatively crime-free areas.
Cases of kidnapping for ransom pose a tough gauntlet to the skill and
ingenuity of a police professional. His competence is openly on test
while criminals negotiate ransom with the victims. This is the stage in
which the scelerate ingenuity of the subdolous criminals is in excelsis
while providing the real opening to the police to catch the criminals
red-handed. The incertitude of the situation bring the true skill of the
police to the acid-test. It is a live challenge to the police- a
climacteric. His single faux pas in the glidder path of his manoeuvres
may make life and death difference to many. The knowledge makes him
nervous. The albatross gives him delitescent strength and drive to move
him forward with a resolution to succeed. This is the real moment of
policing. The thrill of real policing lies in such live moments and real
joy in bringing relief to the people in real distress.
POLICE IN THE ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE

Justice begotten at a cost is justice lost. The fact is lost sight of by
the present administration of justice. Justice is a natural right. It is
the sine qua non and raison d’etre of social grouping. Justice in a
social environment have to be as natural as sleep or oxygen to a living
being. Free and fair justice is the leges legum of human rights. The
proficiency of justice administration has to be assayed with this litmus
test and the role of the police in the system has to be judged by its
contributions to this goal of the justice administration system.
Justice in its basic sense necessitates an integral vision. Justice

abstracted from its environment, past, present, future, diverse issues,
dramatis personae and related events cannot be justice in the true sense
of the word. Justice in parts is no justice that lasts. Justice involves
delving deep down to the heart of an issue and delivering justice in
reference to all related issues and matters to the rightful entitlement
of all. This presupposes a passion for objectivity and justness and
above all, selflessness in the arbitrators of justice as well as in
those who are in the service of the administration of justice. The role
of the police in the administration of justice comes to scrutiny in the
context of their non a such part in the investigation of crimes and
maintenance of law and order.
Police play umpteen roles as grassroot executors. They are basically

performers, actual doers in the field. Passion in the normal trait of
action. Objectivity and justness seldom give company to those who act to
show results. Expecting selfless traits in a profession like police is
waiting for rain drops from white clouds. They do perform duties with
normal flair and loyalty while put in service of justice. The tragedy is
that the loyalty of the police prefers the interests of the rich and
powerful to the abstract idea of justice they are put in service of.
Loyalty to justice is a noble cause. It signifies a heightened mind

bound to a heightened cause. Loyalty to a value or a just cause is
always a great virtue. The same cannot be said about loyalty to
individuals of whatever importance. Loyalty by definition signifies loss
of freewill and independence of thought. Loyalty is a binding, strong in
that, an emotional binding by volition, but a binding nevertheless;
there is no independence in it. It is a mortgage of the self. Loyalty
denotes polarisation of the self; devotion to one, and thoughtless
opposition to whoever stands up to the object of the devotion. This
notion renders loyalty devoid of any sense of justice, which bounces
from the springboard of freedom of thought and independent judgement.
Ergo, individual loyalty in the service of the administration of justice
is self-defeating to the cause of justice. The Achilles’ heel lies in
loyalty basically being a faith, a blind faith. Sans stirrings in the
conscience. It is an inferior submission to a superior existence, ipso
facto subverting per se the very foundation of the cardinal principle of
equality among individuals. The only loyalty to conscience, freedom of
thought and independent judgement. A police man with this loyalty can do
exemplary job in service of the administration of justice.
Police as the cutting–edge of the governance, enjoy enormous powers.

Bringing law-breakers and criminals to book is just a part of the
gargantuan responsibilities on their shoulders. As the task-masters of
the statecraft, they are invested with diverse rights and privileges.
They have a peek to all private as well as public activities of the
citizenry. They can constrain people to perform specific tasks and
forbid from doing others in the national and public interests. They
prevent, check, prohibit, restrain, regulate, confine or arrest erring
people depending on time to time needs dictated by the circumstances.
They can forcibly break open, enter, search and seize when need arises.
They use weapons to hurt and kill. The wide spectrum of powers impinging
on the basic rights of the plebeian places the police on a pedestal
different from that of the common man as far as the administration of
justice is concerned. These extraordinary powers are tools of the police
in serving the interests of justice. The police, as the means of
justice, are often exempted from the process of justice by the law
itself. Human nature being what it is, the need of keeping the police in
tight leash regarding exercise of their sensitive powers has become
conditio sine qua non for the administration of justice.
The relevance of the police in administration of justice is two fold;

one, fair exercise of their responsibilities in the interests of
justice; two, fair exercise of their powers to ensure that no harm is
done to the process of justice. As dispensers of justice during
investigation of crimes and maintenance of law, police perform highly
sensitive tasks capable of undermining the very process of the justice
administration, Police enjoy unrestricted freedom unbecoming to the
sensitivity of their job. Practically, there are no means to force them
to comply with the needs of objectivity and fairplay in work save their
own interpretations of laws and actions. Postliminary intereferences of
courts are too little, too late to be meaningful. By the time an issue
knocks at the doors of courts, damage to the process of justice could
have been irrevocably done. Whatever courts to thereafter help only
partial recovery from the damage. Innocent people would already have
been arrested, chargesheeted and harassed; decent people would have been
dishonestly denied rightful dues in the name of maintenance of law;
criminals would have been willingly let off the noose; or hors la loi
would have been let free to do things in violation of the extant laws as
quid pro quo. What police do in the name of dispensing justice are
material to the hoi polli, not what courts deliver, if deliver at all,
at some distant future. The fact brings the police centre-stage in the
administration of justice. Police unequipped for the crucial role is the
crux of the issue. Lack of sound mechanism of supervision and poor
position of policeman in society, mediocre education, deviant job
culture etc inhibit police from performing at levels adequate for the
importance of their responsibilities. It denies them organisational
pride. Field orientations distract them from high human values. Weak
economic position and easy opportunities for dishonest riches render
them prone to corrupt practices. There is nothing tangible in their
service to inspire commitment to noble causes. Their job culture does
not inspire them to delve deep into diverse nuances of their job. Their
service lacks in facilities to enhance professional competence.
Consequence is shallow policing, mechanical works en face policing
crying for deep, intellectual analyses of its relevance for
establishment of a just society and national well-being. Shallow
policing is responsible for all the mishaps and turbulence of the first
half century of independent India. The period saw police distracted to
go berserk seeking parochial and selfish ends. A force committed to
parochial and selfish interests can hardly do any justice to the
administration of justice.
Another relevance of the police in the administration of justice is

exercise of their special powers without committing wrongs against
justice. Police are dangerous fences with their extraordinary powers
potential to uproot and destroy the crops they are put in charge. Their
enormous powers presume special responsibilities on their shoulders to
protect innocent people from rash exercise of powers. This is an
infinitely more difficile responsibility considering what human nature
is and how every man suffers from a blind spot about himself. Every
person is right for himself. Every criminal is just in his own
assessment. Every act, every human being, does has its own logic,
reasons and justifications. Nobody ever is wrong to himself. This is
true of the police too. Every encounter, every lockup death, every third
degree method, every wrongful confinement, every illegal arrest, every
excess committed by police has its own police justifications. It is
irrelevant how the justifications. It is irrelevant how the
justifications appear to outsiders. You seld find police confessing to a
wrong or an excess committed. We have examples of police commissioners
justifying gunning down of innocent citizens by subordinates in broad
daylight in a busy street as a bonafide cause of mistaken identity. We
have any number of cases of senior police officers colluding with
subordinates in destroying evidences of lock-up death cases. Punjab
police revelled in hushing up cases of cold-blooded murders through
false encounters. Police excesses are justified by the top-brass per
procurationem of the solidarity of the police force as though the
concept is inimical to the interests of justice. Use of third degree
methods is excused as the bedrock of policing as if justice is as
irrelevant concept as far as police are concerned. The ambience, with
the police going berserk with their special powers to establish a just
society, is not conducive to the administration of justice. The police
are committing wrongs against justice by the very means invested to them
to protect the interests of the justice. This is an irony of the
relevance of police in the administration of justice.
The cause of failure of the police lies more in the systems failure the
character of its dramatise personae, deviant job culture and wrong
leadership than in the concept of police. Police in inappropriate milieu
may turn into a Frankenstein. It is like a herd of tamed elephants in a
khedda operation. Lack of direction, weak management and poor
organisation turn the tamed rogues on rampage against the organisational
goals instead of bringing of knees the ferae naturae. Remedial measures
have to be found for the prevarications rather than blaming the police
tout a fait.
Policing being a specialised job with rare keeks inside by outsiders

about measures and decisions taken in disparate circumstances, few
outsiders comprehend that the job gives tremendous leeway for work and
decisions, be it crime investigation or maintenance of law. This is a
dangerous liberty in the system of dispensing justices that warrant
preciseness and smug exactitude in the sensitive business of balancing
justice. The sensitivity is briller par son absence in the present
police and policing system. Justice being what it is in the present age
of prolate concours making threatening differences , the leeway in
policing process gives scope for favours, misuses and corruption. Lack
of real supervision and control over the work ab extra is another face
of the problem. Beginning from deciding whether a prima facie case is
made out in a complaint and whether the case is to be investigated to
whether it is to be chargesheeted, at what stage, on whom, with what all
evidences, every decision is exclusive police decisions. How an
investigation proceeds, at what speed, whom to arrest and whom not, at
what stage, whom to release on bail and whom not to, what to search and
seize, where, at what juncture of time, the direction of the
investigation to be pursued and what turns to be taken at what phase,
police decide on own without reference, supervision, guidance or control
from outside. Though laws provide for courts to keep track of the
process of investigation, it is rarely the case in the field. The
situation is blatantly glidder in the field of maintenance of law sans
the mechanism of courts keeping track of the issues unless the matter is
filed, before a court of law. The Achilles’ heel is taken advantage of
by the rich and the powerful. Police have become willing tools in their
hands in warping justice in barter of the crumbs they throw from the res
gestae of their unjust deeds. The situation is conspicuous in police
bending laws in favour of the people in power to let them out of the
noose of laws or crush their enemies or keep Sophocles’ sword hanging on
the crowns of their opponents to ease political manoeuvres. The
degringolade began during the emergency of 1975, saw a rising swing in
1980s and found in excelsis in the early 1990s with courts taking
cognisance of the situation and convinced about the need of their
intereference in the interests of the administration of justice. Public
interest litigations became popular. Higher courts ventured into close
scrutiny of investigations into cases against people in power. It became
public that there was no history of convictions of powerful politicians
in independent India in criminal cases investigated by investigating
agencies including the CBI and rarely such cases were investigated but
on political compulsions. The premier investigation agency and its chief
were subjected to strictures in open courts for nonperformance, partisan
approach and contempt of court in investigations to cases against people
in power. Close scrutiny of the investigations led to arrest,
chargesheet and conviction of powerful political leaders. The tragedy of
the awakening is that the so called judicial activism saw itself serving
the interests of the political witch-hunt preceded it. This considerably
reduced the impact of the elert courts on the national scene.
The witch-hunt became a part of the policy of survival of United front

government that followed. The use of the CBI and revenue enforcement
agencies to bring political rivals to submissions led to the fall of
government in April 1997.
The state terrorism against political rivals became a perfect art in

1970s with the use of intelligence agencies for surveillance and opening
secret, files, and in 1990s with the use of investigation agencies for
manoeuvring investigations into criminal cases, with the willing
cooperation of police leaders in the respective agencies. While the
trend strengthened the position of the chief executive of the
government, it sine dubio, weakened the political fabric of the country,
so essential for a democratic process. In comparison , misuse of
investigating agencies proved a deadlier assault on the political
process of the country. Jain-Hawala case caught the popular attention as
nothing before. The case took down its author and his party with his
political rivals to the drains. The coalition government that followed
used the same ropes to strike a wedge among the leaders of the party
that supported it from outside by terrorising some through the CBI and
revenue enforcement agencies and luring others with the crumbs of power.
Bofors kickback case got a lease of life. St.Kitts forgery case and
Lakhubhai Pathak cheating case were re-enacted and manoeuvred to net-in
strategic political rivals on filmsy evidences.Rs.133 crore Urea scam
and JMM bribery cases loomed large. A key leader was interrogated
without sound grounds for possessing wealth disproportionate to known
sources of income and later implicated in Tanwar murder case on
suspicion. The party was subjected to various enquries by revenue
enforcement agencies. The acts nailed the fate of the coalition
government to prove that misuse of police often goes counter productive
in political manoeuvrings as did in Tamilnad where erstwhile Chief
Minister, Ms.Jayalalitha, found a series of criminal cases stacked
against her and her associates, once she fell out of power and popular
support.
Recent past saw executive heads of government opting for their own men
in the police force to head the premier investigation agency of the
country and political rivals being investigated and chargesheeted at
politically opportune times on flimsiest grounds while cases of national
significance on sound footing were dragged on for decades wantonly.
Often, ambiguous entries in diaries to prove bribery and old photographs
together in public functions to prove collaboration became conclusive
evidence to proceed against inconvenient political leaders. It was a
scene of every successor hurling criminal cases against his predecessor.
Police reduced to a tool of political revenge in this powergame. In the
process, the police lost its credibility as a nonpartisan player and an
invincible tool of establishing justice. It is a pity that the lee-way
police enjoy in policing contributed to its loss of face and spine by
its patent sequacious comportment and lack of passion to the case of
justice.
Opportunities of dispensing favours during maintenance of law are common

and aplenty in policing. It be raids on vice dens, issue of licences, or
action on rowdy gangs, decisions of police about whom, when and how,
play important role in political gameplan. The decisions and concomitant
actions more often than not, are taken on political convenience rather
than as measures of curbing lawlessness. Police act as conduits of
partisan measures in favour of the powerful rather than as tools of
administering justice to all. Power assumed higher importance to police
than justice. Vice dens, criminals and rowdy gangs, bien chausse with
political patronage or money power, are not only allowed to run
trouble-free, but often protected to the hilt by the police. This is how
the police in the job of serving justice are stabbing it en arriere.
Police patronage to hors la loi is ephhemeral and changes colours with

the change of guard in the government. Personal ambitions of some in the
organisation lead to partonages ectogenous to political manoeuvres in
form of crosspolitical allegiances and subservience to rich and
influential segments of the society. In the maelstrom, justice suffers,
and the nation, its constitution and the general public to whom the
police as the guardians of justice are responsible, suffer.
Police is not the odd-job boy of the government. It is not the hand-maid
of politicians in or out of power. Police is an organisatioon of
professionals committed to the safety, security and well-being of the
country. Justice and rule of law are the litmus tests available to
achieve these ends. Once police miss the bus of justice and the rule of
law, their goals of safety, security and well-being remain a distant
dream. They lose the credibility and respect of the public, so essential
for effective and perficient policing. The fear the police inspire can
not take it far in absence of credibility, respect and sympathy of the
public. Once the police lose their usefulness in political and power
gameplans consequent to losing public credibility, their political
patrons will discard them like used condoms. The best bet for the police
is to be professional and committed to their responsibilities towards
the administration of justice. Police would forget this need only at
their own peril. Doing anything violative of its raison d’etre like
sabotaging the course of justice will prove to be fatal to the relevance
of the police for the society.
The relevance of the police lies in its usefulness to the administration

of justice au reste safety and security. Police are the arms of the
administration of justice. They are the drive and thrust of the
administration of justice. Paralysed arms crumble the body of the
administration of justice. Arms struck by struck by gangrene, poison the
whole system of the administration of justice. As a vital organ of the
administration of justice,police have inherent potentiality to sabotage
the interests of justice ab intra in umpteen kinds including blatant
mendacity. Inordinate delays in the process of investigations is one.
Bartering justice is another. Subjecting justice to the terms of quid
pro quo is one more. Inefficient and shallow policing add to the list.
Delivering partial justice adds to the problem. Refusing to act against
injustice is another kind of injustice to justice. Making justice a
costly affair gives another dimension to the issue. Effectiveness of
police lies in its ability in making justice an easily and cheaply
dispensable commodity. Police are the first line of the means of
dispensing justice. Courts come to the scene only in far later stage for
restricted number of cases. For the hoi polloi, police is the first and
the only easy defence against injustices. Most cases of disputes never
cross the thresholds of the police stations. Police do act as
arbitrators of justice in criminal as well as civil cases in exercise of
the wide spectrum of responsibilities of crime investigations,
investigations, maintenance of law, enforcement of order, preventive
measures and security duties. They enjoy a key position in the
administration of justice. A good police certainly symbolise effective
administration of justice more than courts and prosecution department
together do. That is why a sound police system is conditio sine qua non
for the health and progress of the country and its tenuous social
fabric
QUOTA SYSTEM CAN WEAKEN CIVIL SERVICE

It is a historical fact that India was never a single nation at any time
till the 20th century. Neither Asoka of the Maurya dynasty nor Samudra
Gupta or Chandra Gupta of the Gupta dynasty nor Akbar or Aurangzeb of
the Mughul dynasth could boast of binding al the regions stretching from
Kanyakumari to the Karakoram pass, and from the Rann of Kutch to
Arunachal Pradesh under a single rule. If India is a single nation today
the credit should go to a large extent to its distinguished civil
service of the early and middle 20th century which was rightly called
the steel frame of India unity. Should India continue as a single
nation, it has to be again mainly through the grit, strength and quality
of its civil service.
The worst curse for India is the classification of people on the basis
of birth with the lower strata being denied equality of opportunity for
growth and a decent life. Post –independent India, as a welfare state,
took a number of measures, both constitutional and legislative, to erase
the sins perpetrated on the unfortunate sections of society, like
removal of untouchability, prevention of atrocities, reservations in
jobs and providing educational opportunities. Such measures are not only
the compensation India must pay for having deprived some of its children
of their growth opportunities, they are also a kind of remorse the
country suffers for its past sins.
But the cardinal question is the direction such measures must take.
Wrong policies in such matters may not only fail to make the measures
efficacious; but may also block the existing opportunities. It may
weaken the country’s social fabric and pose a real threat to even the
existence of India as a country. The policy of job reservation in civil
service carries the danger of undermining the quality of the steel frame
and deprive India of its main binding force.
The victims of the age-old stratified class system deserve many more
special privileges. They need easier access to educational opportunities
to prepare them for higher slots in life. Hence, the need for
reservations in educational institutions. To remove their poverty for
which Indian society is historically responsible, they have to be
provided with easy finance, whether for higher studies or business
ventures. Perhaps, an apex development bank with branches in all
districts exclusively for their financial needs of a non-consumptive
nature has to be set up to provide funds at a nominal rate of interest.
Liberal scholarships, concession in or exemption from application fees
for jobs, a wider network of board and lodging facilities for students,
special vocational training for men and women, concessional hostel
facilities for working men and women, easy housing schemes, free
advanced medical treatment, etc are other schemes for the
underprivileged that may help to bring them on par with the rest of
society, without in the process affecting the quality of its governance.
Basically, democracy signifies the rule of the common man. But this
definition applies principally to the political system and not to the
civil service which is expected to be the spine of democratic rule. A
sound civil service draws the boundaries of governance within which the
democratic system must function and also inspires a sense of moderation,
discipline, fairness, legality and reasonableness in the political
leadership. It absorbs the shocks of political follies and helps the
political leadership in taking sound and intelligent decisions.
The well-being of the repressed classes of the India depends upon the
survival of India as a single nation and therefore on the quality and
soundness of the civil service. Measures like job reservation are bound
to be counter-productive by weakening the civil service structure.
Quality and excellence are inseparable from pride. Any allowance to
mediocrity leads to flight of quality and excellence till mediocrity
completely takes over. This is what is feared about the present India
civil service thanks to the reservation policy.
The apprehension that the steel frame of pre-independent India has

crumbled into a mediocre set-up because of wrong policies of selection
and recruitment needs serious attention. Several opinion polls point to
the diminishing attraction of the civil service for the Indian youth who
prefer jobs in foreign and private industrial houses and banks. This
trend deserves to be noted by those who are interested in the survival
of India as a nation and a democracy, The interest of the country lies
in marshalling the best talents of the country to run its administrative
services.
RIGHT ORIENTATION IN GOVERNMENT SERVICE
Government service in a democracy is the service of the people by the

people for the people within the reticulation of the rules and procedures
in force. It is the core service of the governance and implements the will
of the people expressed through the collective political leadership. It is
the tool that really manages the country on the tapestry of the adopted
policy by exercising all the wherewithal of a management tool-box like
planning, organizing, execution and control by its ubiquitous presence.
Right orientation is sine qua non for the self-management through own
representatives under the political leadership in the government. People
au naturel are unifocal in self-interests au fond. An orientation of the
right kind to lift them in the direction of the larger interests of the
largest part of the population is the raison d’etre of any government
service. It is this higher direction that ideally differentiates those in
government service from the hoi polloi. Reality is different in the field.
The reasons for that are as diverse as wrong orientation and wrong people
in the service.
OPTIONS:
The choice is bifocal to redeem the situation: either select only the
people of right orientation of larger interests in heart or inculcate the
right orientation by right training, right practices and right job culture
on those who are selected. The process of selecting the people of right
orientation to the behemoth of government service of Indian dimension is
easier said than done. The Indian institutions constituted for the purpose
are too ill-equipped for the job and too steeped in inefficiency,
corruption and lack of positive approach for any perficient performance
even in responsibilities of far lesser magnitude. India has no alternative
but to go for the latter option of inculcating the right orientation.
The second option at best is a weak shadow of the first. Its tools are
directed towards attitudinal change. The tools are too weak for the
immanent changes warranted even if presumed that right training, right
practices and right job culture to bring about the new avatar exist at
all. Human nature is too complex for such an easy metabasis. Right tools
are becoming ascensively far afar to find in the extant power-hungry
milieu of the present government service. The legacy of the colonial rule
in power-centric governance continues even after more than five decades of
the independence. The prise of the power-orientation in preference to
service-orientation is accrescently going tenacious in government service.
Combined with the fact that lesser mortals are now joining the fray of the
government service courtesy selection institutions nonpareil to the job,
the situation can only be imagined. People of all kinds join the service
and indulge in all kinds of loots and sins. People accustomed to long
colonial rule are taking umbrage under the Karmic Law as the misdeeds in
name of governance by their own people are found to be the ineluctable
reality of life. They take epinosic satisfaction by the facts that the
situation is worse in neighbouring and African countries. We are taught to
be patriotic and committed to the country and the government which sins
against us. We are perorated with such inutile plangent phrases as ours is
the biggest democracy in the world and we are a nuclear power ad manum to
be a super power of the world that signify nothing to most Indians weighed
down with misrule. Only right orientation in government service can save
the country from the entoilment and spread a new entrainement in the
people.
LARGER INTERESTS:
The raison d’etre of the government service is its orientation towards
larger interests en face the extant tournure of the narrow interests
critical to human nature. Larger interests imply a sense of right and
wrong, sensitivity to others’ sufferings and a genuine love for the human
kind. Even after presuming the exiguity of such noble qualities in the
ambience around, the standards existing in the extant Indian government
service is far from satisfactory and horrific tout court by any standards.
It is just perversion drunk by the temulence of power. It is erratic to
say the least. It is insulsity at best and perversion at the worst. It is
twisting rules and procedures to meet self-interests al piu. What is
striking is the fact that it has become the culture of the governance of
free India. India has become free perchance to let its government service
to have a dissolute culture of its own choice sans interference ab extra.
This seems the ground reality of the last five decades of the Indian
independence. An example illustrates assez bien the degringolade of the
government service and those who man it.
WRONG MODEL:
A Mathematics lecturer from a college joined government service four
decades back. His fastus from the sudden rise perforce cost him his
seniority in preference to a junior during the training. His unpopularity
among the public got him an entry as “immature” in ACR. He got an
important posting on promotion where he betrayed gratuitous harshness that
cost him the post in less than a year to be posted to head a training
institute.
This is where the crunch of running the government service comes to the
fore and exposes itself in puris naturalibus. A training institute is the
first point of tryst of a recruit with his future service and its head his
true model to become. Hundreds of young recruits passed out as officers in
the next three years from the institute with its head as a model binged in
them. Later, many a precious careers withered under the peise of the wrong
model. The wrong orientations received during the training make inveterate
and lasting impact that cannot be easily deracinated. Wrong models
unwanted other-where heading training institutions is the first symptom of
a grave malady the government service is suffering with.
The officer was denied decent postings promotion after promotion. He was
sent on deputation to head a middle sized state undertaking. His
misconduct there led to a state-wide agitation of its staff in 1985.
Later, he was deputed to head the state prisons department. His
stewardship there witnessed an unprecedented mafia gang war within the
four walls of a prison resulting in murder of an egregious inmate in 1995.
An enquiry by the Home Secretary arraigned the officer for serious lapses.
MISCONCEPTION:
The officer headed his department for five months before retirement. This
is another post where the fonctionnaire serves as a model to the
subordinates. His appointment to the post was opposed by some on the
grounds of merit. This gave rise to two groups in his favour and against
in the department. The new chief in excelsis in his career acted avec
acharnement against those belonging to the opposite camp by sending them
to insignificant posts in god-forsaken corners of the state. He, drunk in
the fulgour of his new status, unreasonably acted on some others assuming
the role of a soi disant motivation specialist and brought gratuitous
sufferings to them. A naïve officer with complete fide et fiducia on the
new chief sought transfer back to the state capital to any of the umpteen
vacant posts existing. The new chief promised an immediate posting and
consented for the subordinate going on leave pending the transfer.
Thereafter, the chief went on delaying the transfer by encouraging the
pianissimo subordinate to extend the leave for the next four months until
himself retired. The subordinate au desespoir approached the State Chief
Secretary only to find that the latter was advised by the chief not to
meet the subordinate. The Chief Secretary did just that. This speaks
volumes about present administration. The achilles’ heel lies in the
mediocrity and the inability of those in higher levels of the government
service in this star-stricken land to comprehend what really constitute
administration and misconceive it as a show of ruthlessness and cruelty.
The justification of the chief for his queer and perverted conduct
oblivious of the sufferings and agony caused was that he was doing all
those things as a motivation specialist to help the subordinate in his
career! His preposterous motivation skills ens rationis was really a cloak
to his native sadism that cost the enfested subordinate his faculty of
trusting anybody. This is a case of pure schadenfreude en pure perte.
SERVICE:
The core of right orientation in government service is an understanding of
the sufferings of others and willingness to mitigate it through the
accepted means of rules, laws and procedures. Power is only the subsidiary
of the process and comes to play as a tool in aid of making service to the
people possible. There is no place for fastus, show of power,
schadenfreude and playing with the lives of others in the scheme. It is
humility and a gemutlich sense of service to others that is fundamental to
it. Any government manned by the people without these essential
ingredients is bound to be a heath of tyranny and face the wrath of the
plebeian in rerum natura. That is why the manning of the government
service warrants utmost care and expertise in running the government. The
edifice of the right governance stands on the terra firma of the right
orientation. The governance is just nonexistent or leads to a welter of
tyranny of the people in the skein of wrong orientations.
RIGHT PLACES:
The right orientation can be either inborn or acquired. In absence of
appropriate tools to trace inborn orientations with certitude, only the
process of acquiring the right orientations can be depended upon. Right
models have tremendous impact on the process as do wrong models. It is the
models and the precedents that determine and festinate the orientation of
the future. Models in right places have tremendous impacts in enracing
right orientations in the body of the government service. Head of an
institution that trains recruits exercises powerful influence on the
recruits. So also the head of the department. Right orientation in
government service can be made a reality by manning these key posts with
right persons.
Another tool towards this end is encouraging right orientation by the

reguerdon of good postings. The objective is bifarious: it inspires the
adoption of the right course; also, rewards to the right people a natura
rei act as a stimulant to create the right job culture. Such a stimulant
is briller par son absence in Indian ambience. It is the reason why
government service now is not what it should be in a democracy.
POWER:
The nature of the government service now is power-oriented; that is, the
exercise of power for the sake of power. It has become an idée fixe. There
is not even a tinge of service orientation in the extant government
service. Even the pretence is left to the care of the political leadership
that must depend on the hoi polloi for survival. Those in government
service need not even pretend to that as they have a secure tenure of
service and go impervious to the plebeian. The accrescent falsidical sense
in government service now is that they are meant to implement the wishes
of the political leadership without any commitment to the ordinary people.
The falsetto must be replaced with a sense of service to the people. There
is no deliverance to the country without it.
The power-orientation of the government service is the seed of all ills of

the country. Power corrupts. So, any government service erected on the
pillars of power cannot be anything but corrupt. A corrupt government
corrupts the country and a country under seize and caught in the
tourbillon of corruption cannot be anything but tyrannic. This is the
maelstrom India finds itself with now. The country can be saved from the
avernus and a stage for the risorgimento can be set only by giving right
orientation to its government service. It is a gargantuan task. The path
of corruption is easy, but retracting the course back is difficile and
almost impossible. But it is a job that has to be attended to on priority
in national interests. If not a pas de geant, the problem has to be
approached in farthing-steps. Relief from the temulence of power cries for
the priority attention. Once the cobweb is removed, the space will be free
for the inculcation of service-orientation within the limits of the policy
and the rules and procedures in force. Right placement of the right models
is crucial to the process. That brings the apollyon of the government
service to heels to ultimately wipe out of the system and dawn a new era
of a healthy government service in the country.
POLITICAL CRIMES AND SECURITY

The importance of political crimes for the police lies in politics and
crimes being two fields ex utraque parte of policing with the police
depending on political leaders for sustenance while acting on criminals
to justify its raison d’etre. The police can ably deal with politicians
and criminals separately in discharge of their professional duties with
their obedience and subordination side furbished for political masters
and tough and ruthless side reserved for criminals. Unfortunately, the
police are not required always to deal with politics and crimes
separately. They are more and more required to handle a special category
of crimes by the name, political crimes where their masters and subjects
join hands to their chagrin. To further flummox the issue, the political
crimes rate the highest in the scale of importance of various crimes on
the basis of national interests at stake, the prominence of
personalities involved and the magnitude of interests, the crimes arouse
in the country and outside. The scope of political crimes range from
petty crimes committed by political activists to serious crimes
including white-collar crimes committed in the colour of performing
political duties to grave crimes against national interests committed
for political reasons from within or outside the country. The gravity of
political crimes and their threat to the national interests subject them
to the scrutiny and handling by a district of distinct security
apparatus attached to the intelligence setup in addition to the usual
purview of the uniformed police. But, the technique of handling
political crimes in India is yet to be perfected. The present technique
is yet a patch work and the police especially at the top are
psychologically ill-equipped to handle political crimes as seen by poor
performance of the Indian police in handling of such important political
crimes as Bofors Gun deal, St.Kitts’ affairs, Jain Hawala case,
anti-sikh riots of 1984 and investigation of cases against godman
Chandraswamy. The result is proliferation of political crimes in India
and fear of a parallel rule by the crime world coming into existence
under political patronage.
CRIME AS A TOOL OF POWERGAME
Vohra Committee report on the nexus of politicians and criminals

perspicaciously indicated Indian political culture for its close links
with the underworld and provided a compte rendu on the havoc created by
the criminalisation of politics and the politicisation of crime.
Politics imprimis being a powergame and an art of possible,
Shakespeare’s characterisation of love and war where everything is fair,
most politicians obviously presume, holds good to their profession as
well. War and politics being two facets of the same powergame, one
external and one internal, there is no point why the axiom that
everything is fair in politics should not be honoured while fairness of
war in all its shapes and forms is sacrosanct. As politics being a
powergame in extremis like war and decides the degringolade or steep
rise of those involuted in it, the politicians are convinced that they
are justified in seeking any means, apocryphal or de jure, to ensure
that they win and survive. Afterall, being suicidal is not a virtue; nor
faulting the art of possible bring any credit in public life.
Ultimately, it is success that decides what is right and wrong. There is
no sin or wrong worse than a defeat. History has shown how success can
absterge even the sin of mass murder of innocent people by dropping atom
bombs. The cardinal goal of survival and success is the first priority
and the means to achieve it takes care of itself. Depending upon the
success or failure of the mission in hand. So goes the thinking of
politicians maintaining close links with underworld. The only gaffe in
their perception of politics is their failure understand politics in a
civilised system like democracy as a powergame selon les regles unlike
emotional games of love and war, where everything goes by emotion and
passion. In a democratic party system, where procedures are shaped to
make the rule of the majority a scientific reality in form of
constitutional provisions, rule of law is paramount and one who moves
extra muros is not only debarred from the game, but also dealt as a
criminal. However , many politicians refuse to accept constraints on
their political powerplay and continue to indulge in links with criminal
world to have immediate need of winning power fulfilled. The crux of the
problem of Indian politics lies in this with certain categories of
crimes in delicius of Indian political field loosening the very terra
firma of the Indian democratic system.
POLITICIAL MURDERS
Political murders are common features these days in India. When a

political adversary grows to be an irritant, too serious for comfort.,
he is seen to be eliminated. No career politician wants to stain his
name with a murder case and get his name registered as a criminal in
police station. He does the work through his faithful underworld
henchmen whom he keeps in good humour always for being available for
such a need, by providing him political support and protection. For
this, he keeps the police at his side. This is easily done by
intervening in police postings and helping to get early promitons for
favoured ones.
BOOTH CAPTURING
A candidate for an election may even resort to booth capturing through

his criminal aides to facilitate his victory. This operation requires
through planning and training of the men involved, apart from the
willing cooperation of the police. An attempt at booth–capturing can
succeed only with the intrenchant nexus between politicians, criminals
and the police for synergy.
POLITICAL KIDNAPPING
Political kidnapping is an international phenomenon that comminated the

world of diplomacy in excelsis in the 1970’s. The Menace trickled onto
the Indian scene though slowly, decisively in the 1980’s. The
realisation that political ends can be easily met by the malengine of
the kidnap-drama opened up an aboideau to the terrorists who were
acharne to meet their political telos. The increase in terrorist
activities in India, perchance, as an outcome of the suspected
“balkanisation of India” policy adopted by some foreign countries, made
political kidnapping an ubiquitious reality on the Indian political
scene from the latter half of the 1980’s. The terrorists of Kashmir and
Punjab set the tone in India which was picked up by the People’s War
Group and the ULFAs in the 1990s. The inexperience of Indian political
leaders in tackling the problem complicated the matter. While most
countries around the world explicated a policy of stubborn refusal to
yield to kidnappers’ demands under straints, the Indian leaders goofed
by displaying their weaknesses while people close to them were abducted,
in yielding to demands as a quid pro quo in releasing large number of
dangerous terrorists, who were arrested at huge cost and loss of lives.
The situation has been further complicated by adopting a policy of
double standards in sacrificing the lives of lesser mortals in some
other cases. It is obviously sending a mauvais depeche to the
would-be-terrorists that the closer the proximity of the kidnapped to a
political leader, the bigger is the chance of meeting their political
ends.
The reclame attached to the kidnap-drama and the arousal of the public
interest in the developments that follow is another dimension of the
political kidnapping that brings an identification and gives an image to
a terrorist outfit as nothing else can. It has become a fashion to
initiate a terrorist outfit with a kidnapping operation. The chevisance
in the inchoate drama proves the strength and resourcefulness of the new
outfit and its locus standi among such other outfits, in the way the
murders committed by a recruit decides his place in the mafia. The
finesse displayed in executing the operation to a successful end decides
the futue of the organisation, a part form the advantages of the ransom
money and the release of compatriots. Interestingly, the first
experiment of political kidnapping in the Indian scene was conducted in
a foreign country in the form of the egregious abduction and killing of
Mr. R.H.Mhatre, a junior diplomat in the Birmingham consulate in the
first week of February, 1984 by JKLF militants.
POLITICAL KIDNAPPING VERSUS DISPLOMACY
Political kidnapping and murder is tout court the most heinuous crime
that often involves cold-blooded murder of absolutely innocent people
for political ends. The mental agony and postliminary destruction
involved to the maledict hostages and their near and dear ones because
of the misguided entrainement of a handful of greenhorns go waste and
make kidnapping an infructuous political tool at the end. The
considerable fall in the incidences for political kidnapping on the
international scene of late is an indication of the increasing
realisation of this fact, Crime scarcely survives in the situations of
haute politique like diplomacy and relations between nations. High
thinking by enlightened people functions as a catchpole to check the
criminal tendencies from being perpetuated. Political kidnapping in the
Indian scene is also bound to be a temporal phenomenon as seen
otherwhere in the world.
PROFESSIONAL CRIMINALS IN KIDNAP DRAMA
A disturbing tread in political kidnapping is the possibility of

professional criminals like smugglers and drug peddlers resorting to
political kidnappings at the hest of their illegal profession in the
guise of political kidnappers. The accrescent dependence of terrorists
and professional criminals on each adds to the complexity. This
unhealthy situation is already true in India as it is in many other
countries.
POLITICAL KIDNAPPINGS IN INDIAN SCENE
The operation Rhino against the ULFA activities is a direct off-shoot of

a series of kidnappings of Indian and foreign nationals and killing of
some of them by the ULFA militants in Assam. The peoples’ War Group in
Andhra Pradesh is going progressively active in kidnapping government
officials to bring the state government on its knees. The government of
Andhra Pradesh is yet to take the gauntlet by the horns. The kidnap
dramas excoriate criminals, politicians and the police to a war of
nerves and those who have steel-nerves in them, emerge successful in the
end. The political kidnappings are further complicating the welter
created in the Indian and international scene by the rise of kidnappings
by misadventurous individuals or groups lucri causa. The kidnappings
becoming the piece de reistance of organised crime as a means of making
a fast buck is already evident on the Indian scene as more and more
reports of businessmen, industrialists or their relatives and children
being kidnapped for ransom appear in newspapers in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh,
Assam, Punjab, Delhi, Calcutta, Bombay and even smaller places.
Ascensive anfractuosity of egregious mafia gangs in these operations is
a pollent possibility. The relevance of the police comes into the
picture in their ingine to check these pernicious developments. The
triste reality is that the Indian police has failed to rise to the
occasion till now.
UNITY OF PURPOSE IN INDIAN POLICE
The political crimes of gargantuan proportion can be successfully

tackled only by pollent police organisation with its all resources and
resolves pooled together. In the current system of policing in India,
police stations and district police units form basic units of the
administration. Some of the functions discharged at these levels have
concurrent jurisdiction with some special units at state and national
levels. Crime investigation in special circumstances can be taken over
from the district police administration by the state CID or the CBI at
the national level. So, it is with the intelligence collection, security
operations, the raising of armed police forces, maintenance of crime
records etc. The police in the state is devised as an independent unit.
In a vast country like India, policing being shared between scores of
independent units with no perspicaciously defined mechanism of
cooperation, the problem occurs of coordination and units of purpose in
tackling challenges that cover more than one of these unity. There are
too many challenges such as these in the increasingly complex society of
India. Except for the sense of national unity there is nothing common
among these units to approach the gauntlets with a common cause. Even
the common Indian Police Service is unable to bring about a unit of
purpose to policing throughout India. This gives an impression of
fragmentation in the Indian police. A fragmented police cannot turn out
work in full-stream owing to the waste by leakage in the process of
co-ordination between the fragmented parts. India must consider devising
a pollent unitary police administration at the centre with full control
over subordinate state and union terrotory police setups. This would
avoid coordination problems and help policing to be more purposeful in
tackling challenges from the national perspective . It also makes
available larger resources from the national level for policing apart
from strengthening the sense of belonging to one police. This is
necessary in the interests of the country and its policing in the
future.
CRIMINAL LAWS
A few glaring anomalies and some erroneous provisions in the extant

criminal laws of India contribute to be easy escapades of criminals from
the clutches of law in many cases and harassment of innocent persons by
the police in some other cases. The loopholes in the criminal law have
to be plugged imprimis if crime administration has to be effective in
India and command a semblance of respect and confidence of the public.
The police or judicial officer under whose custody a person is kept

under detention should be made responsible by name for the latter’s
timely release with a provision that if detention exceeds the period
provided by law, it will make the concerned officer liable for
proceedings for unlawful detention without the privilege of exemptions
for actions performed in official colour, available under the extant
laws. Also, all cases of violence and physical outrages committed in
police custody should be made punishable with exemplary penalties by
special legislations. Such outre measures may bring an end to shocking
criminal acts committed eo nomine policing in some quarters and save the
Indian police from the embarrassment of serve public resentment.
CRIMINAL LAW BOARD
India requires the constitution of a statutory Criminal Law Board as an

advisory body to liaise between the police setup and the union law
ministry regarding criminal laws to facilitate glib policing. The board,
as a permanent body, may have seniormost officers of the central
government from home and law ministries, police and prosecution
departments, distinguished humanists and senior advocates of the Supreme
Court as members with the union home minister as its chairman. It must
undertake the study of the need of changes in criminal laws from time to
time. The board may meet every quarter or a year and discuss extant
criminal laws and their shortcomings in the light of representations
received from officers in the field from the police and prosecution
departments and make proposals for requisite changes in criminal laws e
ra nata.
HUMAN RIGHTS CELLS
Political crimes whether it be of the stature of national politics or

international politics, have the queer propensity of arousing issues of
violation of human rights to crumble the credibility of the
law-enforcers in the eyes of the public. Institution of human rights
cells in each district and metropolitan city as advisory conseil to the
police of the region with local human rights champions as its members to
draw attention to specific instances of inhuman conduct by subordinate
officers would meet the needs to keep the police on pernoctation against
political crimes credible vis a vis likely false hue and cry by affected
political leaderships. The human rights cells should be a dynamic part
of the police administration in the regions and its observations should
set in motion a process of verification and peremptory action. Though
subjecting police to the scrutiny of an outside setup may appear a
retrograde measure, it may help the assuefaction of the policing methods
to human comports in rerum natura and save the establishment from the
charges of violation of human rights in controlling political crimes a
la Kashmir, Punjab and elsewhere in the country.
INTELLIGENCE OUTFITS
Collection and analysis of intelligene and special operations from the

building blocks of all nuances of the police operations. Indian
intelligence system is yet to stand up to the enormous challenges thrown
to it in detecting and controlling political crimes and can nowhere be
compared with its counterparts in developed and even a few developing
countries. Various intelligence outfits of India are often found
functioning at cross purposes even in protecting VVIPs and other
sensitive targets from political crimes. India should reorganise and
strengthen its intelligence outfit if it is to survive the challenges
and stand up to the threats of political crimes to the integrity,
security and law and order of the country.
UNIFIED INTELLIGENCE AUTHORITY
The Indian intelligence system may develop unity of purpose and

operation to control political crimes ab intra and ab extra by working
under the umbrella of an unified intelligence authority with the chiefs
of all intelligence organisation as members. The authority must affect a
synergy of intelligence operations through its various wings of
internal, external, counter, military and security intelligence.
Sufficient attention has to be given to infuse entrain to the
intelligence system of India and modernise its methods to raise it to a
few degrees closer to the international standards. The interferences of
offficialdom need to be minimised and a sense of commitment and
dedication to be infused by making intelligence operations a lifelong
career.
The ultimate purpose of all police functions is public security. Either

it is intelligence collection or crime investigation or maintenance of
law and order, all roads leads to this single aspiration. Therefore, the
security operations form the crown of policing activities, without which
all other police operations prove futile exercises.
SECURITY OPERATIONS
India needs specially trained battalions of security operators in every

state to take charge of the security of vital installations and VIPs.
Also each state police unit may have a small commando force to meet
threats during emergencies like hijacking, VVIP security under difficult
circumstances, complicated operations against terrorists etc. This
special group has to be brought into operation only under exceptionally
difficult circumstances. Otherwise, it has to be involved in continuous
commando training of the highest order. The commandos have to be
well-equipped with the wherewithal of commando operations of the latest
order. Only select officers may be recruited to the group with extra
emoluments to make the job really elite. The commando units of the
central government must train the state commando forces.
The need of commando groups in the state police forces will be

increasingly felt in future as the menace of terrorism and sabotage
grows uninhibited with the future possibility of violent methods being
accepted as legitimate ways of expressing political dissent.
INADEQUATE SECURITY PLANNING
The present perception of internal security in India revolves round a

few catchwords like prohibited areas, protected areas, official secrets,
sensitive installation, static guards, armed pickets, mobile patrols,
striking forces, perimeter protection, infiltration, mechanical
breakdown, external and internal attacks verification, unobtrusive
watch, internal watch, intelligence collection, top-secret papers,
security information, leakage of information etc. Model internal
security scheme, containing jugglery of these words are available in all
district police offices. The plans in the schemes do not touch even the
fringes of the present security needs. Secondly, the model schemes are
based on outdated facts and statistics which have become irrelevant in
postliminary periods. Though these model schemes are expected to be
updated from time to time, seldom are they touched. This renders them
irrelevant to a given phase of time. Thirdly, the security guidelines in
the model schemes can in no way make a claim to expertise. They are
simple suggestions based on common sense. Any police official with a
sound field knowledge can improve on them according to specific
instances by relying on his own savvy. For all practical purposes, these
model internal security schemes have become passe and impair. They have
only historical interests in the neoteric scheme of things.
The model security schemes enumerate in terrorem the likely sources of

threats to the country’s internal security, such as aggression by an
alien power, sabotage and subversive activities, communal riots, student
unrest, extremist activities, violent labour problems, natural
calamities etc. The schemes distinguish between peacetime threats and
wartime threats and deal with each period with various stages of
approach like precautionary stage, preventive measures and protective
measures. What are striking in these schemes are the details of work to
be attended to, like evacuation of lunatics, police-public relations
peace committees, mobilisation of NCC and volunteer organisation etc.
But, unfortunately, there is nothing really instructive in these schemes
for a security officer of good field experience and sound common sense.
The only advantage the schemes provide is that all obvious measures are
listed in a raisonne nutshell for easy reference. But, as said before,
albeit the measures listed out are exhaustive as routine jobs to be
performed in such disturbances, they in no way, help in tackling complex
internal security challenges of the present day. The reason for this is
that the format of the schemes was conceived decades back when
challenges of internal security were simpler and on expected lines. No
serious thought was given to overhauling the format of the scheme since
then. The position though is similar in respect of the blue book which
deals with aspects of security for dignitaries, political compulsions
helped to update them as more and more dignitaries fell to the bullets
of exremists. The updating of the blue book is one of the plus points of
the subservience of the police to political masters. Yet, the blue book
too needs a complete overhauling on the basis of the new realities of
security challenges and new perceptions and conceptions about meeting
such challenges.
CHALLENGES OF INTERNAL SECURITY
What the new blue book and new model internal securiy schemes need are
guidelines on how to approach a security challenge and not what
peripheral matters should be attended to, Each security challenge of the
present day is sui generis and needs a specific approach depending upon
the time, the place and other circumstances of the challenge. It is too
simplistic to imagine that a common formula, however exhaustive it be,
can tackle all internal security challenges of the present day. The blue
book and model internal security schemes must lay down broad guidelines
and the spirit with which security challenges, available methods of
approach for each class of challenge, salient features of the risks
involved and precautions to be attended to alternative courses of action
and assessment of the chances of success for each course under different
circumstances etc. The security guidelines must name the nature of
security threats under various situations and list out likely targets of
sabotage under all imaginable circumstances. They must be able to
forewarn about potential sources of threats and suggest ways and means
of overcoming them and invent short and long-range plans to meet likely
serious challenges. Such an approach to security relieves pressure on
prototypal security and shifts stress to creative security and saves
manpower and other resources from being wasted on unproductive quotidian
mobilisation. This works an a panpharmacon to the under-utilisation of
precious security tools by unintelligent routine deployment.
Political crimes call for special skills in police in handling them as

the crimes involute political leaders and ergo, sensitive in nature.
Such crimes are often of national importance and draws the glare of
pubic attention with all hues of judgements passed by all kinds of
people. There would be pulls and counterpulls by influential people from
different sides at all levels of policing to handle them in a particular
rendering objective appropinquation to such crimes non possumus, unless
concerned police officer dares to endanger his own career prospects and
even his life to achieve the object of objectivity. Only special skills
save police from such a terrible fixe. The skills are hard to come and
very taxing on the police. But, these are the job hazards and police
must learn to live with it.
ENFORCEMENT OF SOCIAL JUSTICE

Social laws can be social laws only if they are of the society, from the
society and for the society. They have relevance in a society only if
they are unrevocably concinnous with everyday lives of its members- in
terms of their ken of the laws and its general acceptance. Social laws
that are abstruse and unacceptable to the plebeian are destined to
atrophy because they lack en arriere the inherent mechanism of
compelling society to comply with their writ. It is in this sense, that
social laws which are lex non scripta are indited with the stamp of
approbation of the state by popular demand, though the process from the
antipode can be inchoated if their assimilation by the society is
assured through active propagation. The effectiveness of social laws
depends entirely on their assimilation by society and the strength of
propagation and publicity that follows the enactment of the laws. This
need of the social laws being balked is the quiddity of the serious
setbacks faced in making certain social laws like the Dowry Prohibition
Act or the Child Marriage Act effective. The enactment of social laws
that are intended to accord primacy to social norms must be preceded by
intensive fieldwork to introduce the newell and make them acceptable to
the society and enactment should be resorted to only when the idea
becomes ripe enough to be assimilated by the society because the
symbiosis of social norms and social laws is inseparable. Haste brings
definite waste in respect of the enactment of social laws.
A kenspeckle feature noted in most social laws is the lack of

perspicacity in definition of the concepts involved. It is an
understandable glitch when commonsense concepts like dowry, labour,
discrimination, practice of untouchability, compensation or even
marriage makes the quandary of the commission or noncommission of an
offence wafer-thin and often a matter of opinion based on interpretation
of the concepts involved. Though postliminary amendments to the law
based on field experience and interpretations of the concepts by courts
attempt to impale the concepts to a prim form, the inchoate ambiguity
continues to confound the issues in the popular mind, weakening the
credibility of the law itself. The louche spectrum of the impair
interpretations of a concept can turn an offence to innocence and more
perniciously, an innocent person into a criminal according to the
predilection of the investigating officer. The subjectivity involved in
understanding the law society. It is for this reason, concepts in social
laws must be formulated with utmost caution.
Another major hurdle in calling social change through law is the failure
by the authors of the laws to clearly comprehend and indite in them the
causes and mechanisms of the immane social evils they intended to
contain through the laws themselves. The abhorred social practices that
manifest as social evils are only the external symptoms of serious
malady inveterate in the psyche of the society. Attempts to strike at
these skin-deep symptoms prove infructuous in reaching the malady
embedded in the vitals of the system. Often, the persons comminated by
the shallow social laws are simple innocent plebeians who are caught
unawares by the laws while they tread the path laid by their ancestors
by wont or perform acts they consider essential in the existing social
circumstances. The external symptoms, sine dubio, should be fittingly
treated if the malady is to be deracinated with all traces of its
existence. However, such approaches are secondary to the concerted
attack on the ingrained malady which forms the cornucopia of those
symptoms. This exigency is generally balked in most social laws. Only a
springe mind with full grasp of the social problems in the circumstances
of the existing situation can indagate and handle levers sine prole to
set in motion the laws that can strike at the core of the social malady.
This requires advanced study of these immane practices and their social
backgrounds involving psychological and anthropological analysis apart
from adequate public discussion within the society. Unfortunately, no
enactments of social laws are preceded by such vigorous exercises and
the impotency of the laws to excoriate the social evils are inevitably
consectaneous. The laws should provide the pollicitation of punishing
the prime perpetrators of the social injustices rather than catching
secondary or tertiary commis to the commission of the offences.
The glisk of undesirable social practices leading to painful hurtling of

laws often are the consequences of the existing social situations. A
poor father of four girls and a boy in the circumstances of prevalent
admissibility of dowry in the social psyche, non obstante the
criminality of the act, cannot but accept dowry for his son to assure a
reasonability contented married life for his daughters even at the risk
of being immanacled as his conscience is clean about accepting the
dowry. A person living in a closed society in a village has no
alternative but to practice untouchability against his conscience to
save himself from ostracism unless he is a zealous social reformer
prepared to sacrifice his own interests for the cause. In a competitive
business world involving child labour or meager wages, an attempt by an
individual to stand out in compliance to laws against child labour and
low wages is a sure way to close down his enterprise. The state, in such
circumstances, should tackle au fond the social situations that breed
such immane symptoms and the law to be kind and understanding in saving
in innocent people caught in the social clamancy. The scope for
corrective and remedial action and rehabilitation must form an integral
part of social laws to avoid the impression about the social laws as
indulging in supererogations to catch trivial slips of everyday life and
ergo popularly abhorred. Effectively orchestrated public education and
concomitant vigorous social service programmes aimed at changing
specific social situations that boost socially unjust practices must
form an integral part of every social law.
All social laws must have some postern features incorpsed to make them
effective as vehicles of positive social change in view of the delicate
ground the laws cover in their operation wherein people in their
interpersonal relationships are often involved in the hide and seek game
of everyday life. The social offences are both trivial and
serious-trivial in the nature of the acts and serious in the nature of
its consequences. It is almost impossible to demarcate when an act in a
given social situation is trivial and when it attains serious
proportions. Also, differences in norms and values and varying
sensitivity and moods further complicate the issue. It is not possible
to arrive at a uniform definition of concepts like harassment, practice
of untouchability or compensation as acceptable to all situations. The
laws warrant special accoutrements to counter the nonasuch quailings e
re nata as discussed in the ensuing paragraphs.
Social injustices are perforce committed by the pollent on weak and

hapless people. In the present argument-oriented judicial system where
mother justice takes sides on the basis of the kind of the lawyer being
engaged on the strengths of money and power, no social law can do
justice to the weak and feckless gens de peu who are misdight and
nonpareil to their adversaries for the juste rencontre except in rare
obvious cases non obstante the state sponsored legal aid programmes. The
cabal of the versute gens de condition resorting to social evils
necessitates some sui generis safeguards to be inherent in social laws
to make up for the nether social position of the wronged person and
checkmate the malengine and pravity of the powerful. Appropriate
amendments to the Indian Evidence Act to incorpse provisions of sweeping
presumptions in social laws against the accused persons on whom a
prime-facie case is made out, with provisions to prove innocence laying
with them, is likely to lessen the ineluctable disabilities of the
oppressed people. Though such presumptions are extant to varying degrees
now in some special laws, the presumptions must be made a toute force in
all social laws. Such presumptions save the wronged persons, from
proving the wrong usually done at the convenience and terms of the
powerful guilty person sans evidences in the social situation under his
prise.
The special laws must provide for vicarious liability that suspends over
the head of the social group concerned even though there is no evidence
to ineatenate him with the offence. Such criminal liability on the el
patron while it checks him from encouraging or indirectly fomenting
commission of such offences through his acolytes in the social group,
also drives him to prevent those injustices in his group.
There should be mandatory minimum punishments prescribed in all social

laws so that the laws become inherently mordant, independent of the
malicho of the pollent guilty persons. The social laws should abnegate
the behoofs of the anticipatory bail unless the person against whom a
prima facie case is made out satisfies the court about his innocence.
The present queasy trend of prompt anticipatory bails to fugacious
social offenders can be brought under control by this measure.
Each social law must provide ample opportunity for compromise on mutuus
consensus with an in-built raisonne mechanism prescribed to ensure
corrective and remedial measures in fit cases not involving serious
guilt where such a compromise is certain to ameliorate the position of
the wronged persons. The penal sections of the social laws inter alia
must provide for huge fines and compensations with provisions to
streamline the fines and compensations for rehabilitation of the victims
or their dependants.
The social nature of the offences in social laws makes witnesses to the
offence who are insiders of the society in most cases, reluctant
witnesses for the fear of reprisals from the society though injustice
done to one of them turns their clinamen against the guilty. A provision
and concomitant device in social laws to protect the interests of the
witnesses en revanche to their ready cooperation helps investigation of
the social offences.
It is rightly said that justice delayed is justice denied. It is

strikingly so in social situations where the exigencies of survival and
coexistence and future interests force the parties generally
inter-related to apostatise and bury the past cicatrix, leading to the
weak and oppressed again submitting to the tyranny of the powerful for
the sake of survival. In the circumstances, each social law should
prescribe time limits for the continuation of the investigation and
trial. The possibility of summary trails for social offences also should
be probed into and employed as extensively as possible to ensure the
galvanic trial of social offences.
The raison d’etre of social laws is the extirpation of social
inequalities and the establishment of a just society. The telos can be
better achieved if the laws are structured to effect compromises to
rehabilitate a bon droit the wronged persons, preceding the invoking of
penal sections in lost cases. The social laws true to their intentions
must seek a device by which every case of social wrong draws the
attention of the authority for frack intervention and on-the–spot
solutions which is statutorily binding on both the parties to avoid the
crush of the penal sections.
The device can be made a reality by the constitution of Social Justice

Authorities at taluq levels under a judicial magistrate with a police
officer, an officer of the social welfare department, a prominent
lawyer, a representative of local women’s organisations and a
representative of the legal aid board as members. The Authority must
work as a team in the taluq to hear cases of socially unjust practices
on the spot and adjudicate them then and there without resorting to
judicial technicalities and adjournments. The Authority must have an
office with a multi-channel telephone working round the clock with a
widely publicised number by dialing which anybody without giving
identification can report socially unjust practices so that the
Authority as a team reaches the destination within twenty-four hours and
passes orders on-the-spot on hearing the concerned parties. The
Authority must exercise pernoctation over the process of the compliances
to the orders and pass sentences in cases of default. In such a system,
the address and telephone number of the Authority being known in every
village in the taluq is the clavis of perficient chevisance because then
anybody wronged can readily lodge querimonies for redressal. The
approach of the Authority in adjudication must be that of an adviser or
well –wisher rather that that of a government organisation steeped in
technicalities. The Authority should be able to reach every village in
the taluq at least once a month. The leitmotiv behind the set-up is to
affect compromises and rehabilitate victims by levying fines and
compensations if necessary.
The administration of social laws is a specialised task requiring

specialised skills in the police force handling the job. The force has
to be understanding and circumspect in its approach though tenacious
when circumstances warrant. It should have the right ken of the social
circumstances and their problems with a deep sense of commitment to
social justice. These operators should be kind and devoid of the
malfeasance of harsh police methods and should never forget that they
are dealing with distinct problems which are the outcome of historical
reasons and special social situations, that they are dealing with a
wider social malady through the individual symptoms in their hands for
solution and ergo there are no villains in real sense of the term, that
they are social doctors interests only excision of the cancerous growths
from society. This special decession from policing necessitates special
care in recruitments to the job to draw people of appropriate mental
makeup and impart specialised training to reinforce those special
attribution. The police also requires periodical programmes of
sensitisation for the cause of social justice with exhaustive
theoretical inputs. These officers should be au fait in social
legislations which are proliferating in geometrical proportion. This
exigency necessitates the constitution of a special police force to
handle social laws which may be called ‘ Social Police’ distinct from
the normal police in charge of regulatory and other police duties. The
social police should have its parallel organisations at all levels as
per specific needs with distinct recruitment, training and sensitization
facilities. An extra-ordinary commitment to the social cause and out-of
–the normal alacrity in tackling social problems should be the hallmarks
of the social police.
Delayed trails of social offences are more a reality than an exception

while promptitude is a virtue de rigueur for tackling social offences.
The inquietude of delays are often caused by lack of commitment to
social causes. The same can be said about easy anticipatory bails and
easy release of persons arrested for social offences and light sentences
to convicted persons or failure to appreciate available evidences which
leads to frequent acquittals. Such a predicament for social offences
when they are treated on par with conventional cases in courts in
natural because of the popular perception of the social offences as
trivial social problems. A judiciary sensitized it de regueur if the
cause of social justice is to be served in the trial stage. The
establishments of social courts to try exclusively social offences of al
hues is en regle in the circumstances and should prove efficacious. As
distinct from conventional courts, a committed judiciary should be the
bedrock of these courts where hand-picked magistrates or judges
committed a fond to social justice and specially sensitized to the
social causes preside. The courts, owing to their specialisation in
trying social offences would be in a better position to appreciate the
special circumstances of the offences and therefore appreciate evidences
in the right perspective and with sympathetic understanding. The
specialisation also facilitates fast disposals while the sensitzation
helps to see through the gravity of the offences so that unduly light
sentences are not pronounced and persons arrested for social offences
are not wantonly released on bail.
Similarly, specially handpicked lawyers should be posted as prosecutors

to the social courts. These prosecutors should be selected on the basis
of their commitment to social justice and undergo a course in
sensitization to social causes prior to their posting to handle social
offences. A case of social offence would be feracious in the hands of a
prosecutor who is committed to social justice and specially sensitized
for social causes.
DEMOCRACY FOR WHOM?

Democracy in puris naturalibus is the rule of the powerful, by the
powerful, for the powerful. It is a concept popularised by the powerful
of the West for their own advantages all over the world though the
concept as a a priori theory as the rule by the people is based on sound
principles and noble intentions. The second chapter of the democracy
namely liberalisation is another instance of a noble concept based on
the sound principle of free dynamics of human forces going awry as a
policy of the powerful, by the powerful, for the powerful. Again, the
powerful of the West are found pushing through the agenda of
popularising the concept a toute force as a state policy all over the
world for their own advantages. The result is that the world is
increasingly becoming a haven for the rich and powerful at the cost of
the hoi polloi.
FAILED HOPE:
India valiantly fought against foreign rule for more than a century with
the hope of bringing deliverance to the country and eutaxy for its
people. The half-century of the democracy sinsyne proved the mendacity
of the hope and enthusiasm. The situation can be described in following
two stanzas of the poem, “To A Conscript Of 1940” by Herbert Read:
We think we gave in vain. The world was not renewed.

There was hope in the homestead and anger in the streets
But the old world was restored and we returned
To the dreary field and workshop, and the immemorial feud
Of rich and poor. Our victory was our defeat.

Power was retained where power had been misused
And youth was left to sweep away
The ashes that the fire had strewn beneath our feet.
EXPLOITERS:
The only difference India saw in democracy is the shift in exploiters
from the foreign rulers to the rich and powerful among the natives.
While the foreign exploiters were circumspect and scrupulous in their
exploitations for the fear of the world opinion and their native moral
scruples, the native exploiters threw their conscia mens recti to the
wind and turned ruthless in their greed and heartless in their
exploitations of the poor and unenlightened mass of the co-patriots.
They have neither the moral scruples nor the fear of the world opinion.
Nor the supremacy of the hoi polloi in a democracy fluster them. For,
their native intelligence is too pollent to be caught by such foolish
concepts. They learnt the tricks of the trade assez bien early. They
know how their side of the bread can be buttered and why there is
nothing on the face of the Earth including votes and status that they
can’t purchase with their money and power. That was the doom of India’s
democracy and its people.
BRITISH RULE:
India under the British was not worse than the present India if not
better. Those who lived in both the ages speak una voce and hold
testimonies for the irrefutable fact as far as common man is concerned.
Life was easy and quiet. There was a feeling of security everywhere. The
air was pregnant with a sense of morality and respect for higher values.
The public life was clean. There was no violence around except for the
oragious political struggle. There was no tourbillion of corruption as
it is now. Merit always counted. Not every thing was venal as of now.
Life always moved on expected lines and people could plan their life and
future.
AN EVIL PROP:
The degringolade of India subsequent to its democracy is often blamed on
its population explosion in geometric progression and the accrescent
complexity of the life pattern of the present world. It is partially
true. The complete truth lies in the plurisie of the evils of the
democracy that contributed to the descent as an evil prop to the rich
and powerful.
UNFAIR JUDGEMENT:
Elders who lived in both the era and independent and sagacious enough
not to be clouded by pseudo-idealism and concepts of foreign origin
swear that the British really ruled India well non obstante tremendous
odds of the freedom struggle and the alien nature of their rule. The
progress India saw during the period was immense and the country could
move pari passu with the world in the matter of progress and modernity.
India saw large-scale developments during the period in all fields
including social, cultural and administrative spheres courtesy the
initiatives and the active encouragement of the British rulers.
Disparaging the measures as moves of administrative convenience or as
moves to strengthen their prise over the country is a malengine tout
court on the plebeian and a mal-propaganda natural to our native evil
ingine to cover up our mal-administration in the democratic ambience.
Administrative convenience begetting precedence in the unending schedule
of priorities is a common administrative practice anywhere in the world.
A major move like introduction of the railways in India in the 19th
century was misprised as a move to help British entrepreneurs in India.
Such an unfair reclame goes against the spirit of a balanced view and
betrays our flair for tilted judgements. The priorities of the British
administrators certainly were more objective and accountable in
administration en face what we encounter by our own rulers now around:
selfish to the core a fond.
DEMOCRATIC INDIA:
India under democracy has become a playground of the rich and powerful
and a field of their unethical manoeuvres and consectaneous mega scams.
Yet, they are not satisfied with the opportunities a la main. They found
their opportunity in an extension of democracy namely liberalisation
which is vigorously marketed these days by the Western powers to meet
their own interests. Thus, the powers of the West and the powerful of
the country are now joining hands to further undermine the interests of
the poor, weak and the ordinary. It will lead to a situation where only
strong become stronger and perforce weak, weaker. Democracy is not just
freedom. It is the rule of the people comprising rich and poor, weak and
strong, powerful and powerless, competent and incompetent, able and
unable, hopeful and hopeless and the ordinary people. Democracy in its
extant gestalt and liberalisation by its very concept promote the
interests of only the rich, strong, powerful, competent, able and
hopeful few. It is not democracy at all in true sense of the noble
concept.
DEMOCRATIC RULERS:
India of the democratic vintage has its rich and powerful either
indulging in criminal acts or being in nexus with criminals to further
promote their personal agenda of becoming richer and more powerful. In
the process, criminals are becoming real power-centres and criminality
is gaining in respectability in the country. This made life in the
country unsafe and violence, a daily matter. Merit lost its primus.
Personal competence has become secondary or tertiary to money and power
in its ability to boost fortunes. Status and social position have become
the custodies of the rich and the powerful. Election as a democratic
apparatus being money-centric rendered money the centre for power. This
brought money and power closer. Big money being less than a dream sans
resorting to illegal activities in the circumstances of extant rules and
laws rendered criminality prolate and commonplace in India and an
ineluctable ladder to gain power and position in the democratic
government. This led to a strange situation of lawmakers leading the
gang of law-breakers to ensure power and position in the next election.
Can these rulers who perforce break their own laws provide honest
governance to the country? How can the country and its people depend on
such democratic rulers for their security and welfare? India is facing
such a conundrum now.
FEUDAL NATURE:
Democracy made India a feudal nation with innumerable political parties
swearing against each other for the sake of political power. It made the
country a divided house with each faction going for the blood of the
others and turning the country ensemble to a huge factious village.
Hatred and opposition have become the leitmotiv of the public life.
Violence and intrigues have become the accepted means of ascendancy.
Democratic practices undermined the foundation of peace, harmony and
unity of the nation and weakened the fabric of the moral values and
ethical practices in the public life of the nation. The crème de la
crème of the country opted out of the endless strife for power and
position and politics became the dernier ressort of scoundrels in India
as popular saying goes. What can be the character and merits of the rule
provided by such people at the helm? It is where democracy brought India
to.
REAL TRAGEDY:
Democracy in India brought real changes to the rich, powerful and the
political class at the cost of its infima species. It removed all the
hurdles from their path to become richer, more powerful and establish
political dynasties. British were too moral conscious to allow such
things to happen during their rule. They maintained certain minimal
values in public life that ensured some degree of equal opportunity in
all fields depending on merit. Democracy removed the hurdle for the
native rich and powerful and they found their deliverance in symbiosis
and synergy. That is the tragedy of the democracy for the weak and the
ordinary of the country.
SPECIAL PREMIUM:
The advent of democracy is marked by accrescent tax burden on the people
in the name of developmental and welfare activities. The wealth so
extracted was frittered away by inefficiency, corruption or sheer
wastage. The benefits meant for the people seldom reached them thanks to
inefficiency, corruption and the pestilent middlemen who act as the
conduits of democracy. The toil of the people was looted as taxes to
provide for the security and luxuries of the soi disant aristocracy of
the democratic vtntage who assumed special premium for their own lives.
UNEQUAL COMPETITION:
More and more prop of liberalisation is provided to democracy these days
to make the latter further pro-rich and powerful. That provides the
upper strata of the society more elbow-space for manoeuvres and
deceptions to put their money and power to better use and renders the
poor and weak hors concours. Scams of the dimension of US-64 in the UTI
are possible only in such an ambience. Competition is the clavis of the
concept of liberalisation. Competition among the unequal in a nation
where nearly half of the population lives below the poverty line and
less than 1% can be credited to be rich and powerful is nothing more
than a mockery of the principle of an equitable society as well as of
the vaulting intentions of democratic principles like the rule of the
common man and welfare of all.
DEMOCRATIC FOCUS:
Liberalisation per se is not bad as is democracy. It is its concept of
suum cuique as opposed to the concept of social responsibility and the
unjust practices that poison the atmosphere. It is a matter of focus of
the democratic leadership at the helm of the governance. Liberalisation
as a policy is discussed in India for more than a decade now in the
ambience of protecting the interests of the lesser rich of the country
from the competition of the more rich of the world. The plebeian has no
place in the scheme of things of a policy of that dimension. This can’t
happen in a true rule of the people, by the people, for the people where
poor and weak constitute more than 95% of the people.
A CONSCIOUS POLICY:
An ideal rule in quiddity is a rule pro bono publico that protects the
interests of all sections of the people including rich, poor and weak.
But the policy initiatives for the purposes have to be pro rata to the
numerical strengths of the respective sections. It is not the case in
India’s democratic environment. Here, the rich and powerful rule the
roost and the state policy au mieux is directed to their protection as a
conscious policy while the poor and powerless are left to their own fate
to meet both the ends. Because, it is the rich and powerful who count in
the democratic schemes of the country to keep power while the hapless
poor and the weak can wait endlessly in the state priorities. This is
Indian democracy.
HUMAN NATURE:
The achilles’ heel lies in the human nature of seeking power, wealth and
opportunities and those who possess it. Present Indian rulers are not a
rebours to this nature nor those others manning the peripherals of a
democratic institution in India like the media and the intellectuals as
opinion makers of the country. They save some exceptions tend to be
sensational-centric and prefer to move with the lee tide in lieu of
going to the stark truths. They are proved more prone to be affected by
concerted propaganda and twisted rationale than the ordinary man. That
is why an evil like unrestrained liberalisation is accepted as a
deliverance by them una voce; that is why political leaders in India are
glorified in magazines and newspapers as great heroes sans consideration
to their values, merit, performance and ethical standing in public life.
It is their power and status ex consequenti that count over the merits
of great performers who are relegated to the inconspicuous corners of
the pages. The common man himself gives precedence to power and mammon
over merit at his own cost. That is the prise of money and power on the
human kind tout a fait.
ELEMENTARY NEEDS:
Democracy, sine dubio, is an ideal concept. The concept presupposes
certain elementary needs essential for the success of the concept in
practice. Equality among the majority of the population leading to equal
opportunities en principe is centric to the concept. This is not the
case in India. Ergo, the failure. Winston Churchill once said that
democracy is a bad form of government, but it is the best among the
available. Coming from a politician of the democratic dispensation, the
faire bonne mine should be taken with a pinch of salt. Is there no
deliverance to a poor nation like India and other nations of its ilk in
Asia, Africa and South America apart from democracy that does not behove
to the diversities of their populations?
What is the besoin of these nations is a system of government wherein

around forty select people of sound attributes of heart and head as a
team rule the country a la present day cabinet and general assembly in
one with another team of around forty responsible people functioning as
an accountability team to keep pernoctation over the governance with the
present institution of the President mutatis mutandis responsible for
both the teams. Both teams function as permanent bodies with 25% of the
teams retiring once in every three years without an opportunity for
reappointment and together on their own wisdom decide the replacements
ex quocunque capite for both the teams from the people of proven
abilities, integrity and character. The teams together structure the new
teams ex mero motu once every three years after each replacement of the
25% of the teams. The clavis of the new gestalt is selection of the
right people of proven attributes of heart and head ex professo. The
teams together can remove a member of the either team ex concessis when
proved indign for the position and task. Indeed, the ebauche needs
myriad details of immense intricacies to be efficacious. The effort is
worth a try in the interests of a billion Indians.
CORE ISSUE AND THE CORE OF INDIA’S NATIONHOOD

The achilles’ heel of the present day politics is its unwillingness to
comprehend reality in full force and devise strategies ex consequenti.
It may often be an intentional demarche en face an impossible situation
to defer impending disasters or etourderie tout court in comprehending
the intricacies of the reality. In either case, the dimensions of an
issue further entoil to an issue of higher complexities. It is what
happened about Kashmir in the last fifty-five years and continues to
happen now.
IRRELEVANT ISSUES:
The reality is that neither the history nor the religion nor the
constitutional provisions nor the will of the majority constitute a
right to a region to be a part of this or that country in politics
either now or at any time in the past in any part of the world. Neither
it can be now for obvious reasons. History is a matter of flux en train.
No point of time can be selected as a reference point in the continuum
of the sempiternal timeframe to decide the future of that significance.
Religion never gained currency anywhere in the world as a factor of
nationhood. It is more so in the present enlightened world where
religion as a factional entity is démodé in public life. Constitutional
provisions are temporal and subject to amendments. The will of the
people of a region in the vast tapestry of the nation is just irrelevant
even in a democracy as far as deciding the nationhood is concerned as
otherwise every village in a country will turn to an independent nation
and sink the human race in a maelstrom of disorganisation.
KASHMIR AND THE PAST:

India as a nation is a new concept. The concept has no root in history.
Maurya, Gupta and Moghal emperors inter alios ruled vast parts of the
present India and regions outstretching up to Central Asia and present
day Iran at various times before the advent of the British. Kashmir was
part of the empires and of smaller kingdoms under Punjab rulers at
different times. Pakistan was carved out of India as a political
compulsion. The history does not support either the claim of India or of
Pakistan on Kashmir or the claim of some for the independence of
Kashmir.
RELIGION IS PASSE:
India as a secular country is d’accord with the zeitgeist of the present
enlightened world with the people of all religions in symbiosis here.
Seeing any issue through the glass of religion is tout au contraire to
the very spirit India stands for. Islam being the raison d’etre of
Pakistan is its own albatross and does not give it any special claim on
regions anywhere in the world eo nomine. Further, religion being a
factor of politics goes e contrario to the extant international spirit
and rationale. It is so also about Kashmir.
NATIONHOOD:
Nor Kashmir being incorporated in Indian constitution as a part of India
gives India any special claim on Kashmir for the simple reason that any
constitution is the product of the nationhood and not vice versa. India
basing its claims on Kashmir on its constitutional provisions is
misleading. On the other hand, if the will of the people of a region is
given liberty in deciding the nationality, neither India nor Pakistan
nor any other country in the world survive as a nation for long. Such a
will has no sanctity in a nationhood. Ergo, it is neither the cover of
the constitutional provisions nor the ruse of the will of the people
that provide the justification for the claims on Kashmir with certitude.
NATIONAL INTERESTS:
There are myriad talks about the Maharaja of Kashmir signing the
instrumentation of annexation with India with a provision for plebiscite
while invaded by the Pakistan army a la derobee as tribals in 1947 and
India under Jawaharlal Nehru referring Kashmir dispute to the UNO and
the consectaneous UNO resolution going against the interests of India.
Real polity has no place for idealism. Idealism goes idle en face
national interests. The instrumentation of annexation or plebiscite or
UNO resolution has relevance in real polity only until they serve
national objectives. It is true of both India and Pakistan. They truly
are meant to serve only as tools to score points in official talks en
pure perte and as propaganda means. There is no way these factors
ectogenous to the national interests have any say in determining the
future of Kashmir.
REALITY OF KASHMIR:
It is an established fact that India was not really interested about
Kashmir in the initial stages. Recorded history shows how India a
travers its iron man and the then Union Home Minister Sardar Vallabhai
Patel offered to Pakistan bartering Kashmir for Hyderabad. India thought
that Kashmir was expendable to its interests. India ignored Kashmir
altogether until the Maharaja of Kashmir signed the instrumentation of
annexation with India and Kashmir became an integral part of India. In
real polity stripped of all clichés and polished phrases, plebiscite or
no plebiscite, the only reality in the process is that Kashmir had
become a part of India and the only factor acceptable to the real polity
that can reverse the process is use of force. Real polity nowhere in the
world understands any other language even in a civilised world. The
process of annexation alone made India’s claim on Kashmir absolute and
res judicata. It is a fait accompli in real polity until it is forced
away from the Indian Union.
THE GLITCHES GALORE:

The cause of the failure of India in Kashmir non obstante the annexation
lies in its glitches galore en suite in the last fifty five years en
face the commitment of Pakistan and its immaculate works to the cause
beyond its abilities and resources that brought it almost on par with
India as far as Kashmir and military might are concerned. India’s
glitches galore begin with the greed of its aging political leaders
agreeing in hurry to divide the country on communal basis lest they may
lose the opportunity of ruling the country in their lifetime. The
ceasefire in Kashmir on the call of the UNO while the Indian army was on
a winning spree patently betrays the inexperience and lack of toughness
in our political leadership of the time and all of India’s troubles in
Kashmir can be traced to this single bevue. India’s response to
Pakistan’s challenges in Kashmir throughout sinsyne was casual and
disorganised and diplomatic a fond unlike Pakistan’s concerted efforts
beyond its means covering all strategic needs required to stand up to
India about Kashmir. Even its Afghan policy was Kashmir and
India-centric. Its prime intelligence behemoth, the ISI with its
committed cadres, was created basically to counter India. India’s
response to the ISI in form of the RAW with much larger resources at
disposal is yet to stand up to its counterpart in Pakistan either in
efficiency, commitment or sheer performance. Kargil intrusion of 1999 is
a clear indicator of the strengths and efficiency of the ISI. The extent
of the penetration of the ISI in India is yet to be matched by the RAW
in Pakistan. The single target of the Pakistan military build-up
including nuclear arsenal and missile technology is India. The
commitment and spirit of the Pakistan army against India is in no way
amated by the fighting spirit of the Indian army. This is how Pakistan
prepared itself against India in the last fifty-five years for the cause
of Kashmir. It left nothing to chance and succeeded in breeding and
feeding anti-India campaign in the valley of Kashmir. The repeated
military takeovers in Pakistan represent the passion of the Pakistan
army to stall any compromise by its political leadership with India on
the Kashmir issue. It is how Pakistan prepared itself for the cause of
Kashmir.
CORE OF NATIONHOOD:
Pakistan believes that the agenda of the birth of its nationhood is
incomplete without Kashmir. Its military forces are fully en arriere of
the cause. Unless Pakistan’s military might is brought to the knees a
toute force, its Kashmir adventures are unlikely to abate. Pakistan by
no stretch of imagination will settle for anything less than Kashmir
tout a fait at its control as it has become a matter of national pride
to the country en face India’s superior prowess. India in its part
condescend to anything less than as of now only at its own peril as
yielding to Pakistan in anyway about Kashmir now is nothing short of
surrender in real polity. It will be nothing short of the surrender of
Pakistan in Bangladesh war. In this sense, Kashmir has become the core
of India’s nationhood while it certainly is a core issue to Pakistan.
CAUGHT IN A LOGJAM:
With the ultimate positions of both India and Pakistan being defined
with perspicacity and certitude, what latitude can there be for any
rapprochement between the two warring neighbours? All the talks of
settlements and summits are mere diplomatic platitudes meant to satisfy
the inner and outer constituencies of the respective countries. Both the
countries know fully well that nothing other than the present situation
is possible except for minor adjustments along the line of control as in
Siachin glacier and such strategic points. In the circumstances,
Pakistan is trying its luck by appealing to the religious sentiments of
the Kashmiris to lure them away from India in one hand and resorting to
terrorism in Kashmir by supporting jehadi groups on the other hand in
the hope that one day Kashmir perchance may fall on its lap. It perforce
will continue with the strategy unless it is mortally brought to its
knees and good senses.
The only solution to a problem of the nature of Kashmir’s in real polity

is the use of force. Pakistan knows it. India knows it. Pakistan also
knows that it can never subdue India militarily. India knows that a
nuclear Pakistan is a dangerous adversary and it is now too late to
bring the country to its knees. India has to choose between tolerating
its mischief in Kashmir and inducing mortal fear of India pro rata to
its size and resources a tout prix. There is no third option open. This
is the hard truth. India can’t afford the luxury of the wishful thinking
that it can fool Pakistan from its stance and bring it around to the
fact that Kashmir from the day of its annexation to India is the core of
its nationhood or economic and other compulsions ab intra or foreign
pressures force Pakistan to shy away from its commitment to the Kashmir
issue. No talks and summits can really make any difference to the issue
in the circumstances. It is true until Pakistan learns by hard way to
recognise the reality that Kashmir is an Indian territory and it can do
nothing about it until the unlikely event of it outgrowing India in
military might and physically snatching Kashmir out of India. The army
and fundamentalists are too pollent a force in Pakistan to let sensible
voices surface. This is the single most damaging factor in the life of
Pakistan.
STATUS OF WOMEN IN EMERGING INDIA

Indian culture treats women with utmost reverence. Woman is identified
with Adi Shakti or the primordial energy; she is considered as the
prikriti or the basic nature; she is compared with the mother earth.
Woman’s avatar as mother is treated as the highest manifestation of
human relationships. It is mother who gets precedence over all other
principles of life including father and god in importance. She is
considered as the moving force of life. It is presumed that there is a
woman behind every great event of the world. Indian scriptures state
that where women are revered, god resides there. Great epics of India
like Ramayana and Mahabharata revolve around female characters like Sita
and Draupadi. This is only an illustration of the status of women in
India, the honour and reverence with which they are held from time
immemorial, the importance given to them in the scheme of the history
and affairs of human life. Nobody can gainsay these factors in the
scheme of Indian life. However , these are conceptual realities. In a
country and culture where a sacrificial animal is treated as sacred and
worshipped before slaughtered, conceptual realties remain far removed
from ground realities and may even symbolise dangers ahead as ground
realities. It is particularly true about the status of women in India.
Nature created women different from men with a definite purpose. Balance
is stillness and stagnation; imbalance is motion and progress. Nature
designed life and motion by means of the imbalance brought about in the
traits of men and women. In the process, women find themselves at the
receiving end. They ended up as the weaker half of society by their very
nature and are naturally handicapped in a world of men, by men, for men.
In a world where strength commands charity and weakness receives cruelty
and humiliations all along the centuries with patience and in silence.
This part of woman is symbolised in tradition by calling her as the
Mother Earth who bears all sufferings. The cardinal principle of the
survival of the fittest applies to the weak natural attributes of woman
which renders her less fit for survival than man. She must live with his
atrocities unless and until society in an enlightened mood comes to her
rescue.
The immane approach of the stronger world to its weaker counterparts has
to be countered with strong arm methods of the state power. In an
enlightened age such as this, people in public life are sufficiently
sensitized to this issue and more and more legislations come up to stop
stronger people from riding over the weak and meek. India too has
several legislations that have become Acts to protect its women folk.
Atrocities against women in India are mainly rape and unnatural

offences, dowry deaths, abduction and kidnapping for various purposes
and outraging their modesty apart from minor acts like various marriage
offences, dowry and other harassments, insulting the modesty, causing
miscarriage without consent and prostitution. Most of these offences are
punishable under the Indian Penal Code: in sections from 375 to 377, for
rape and unnatural offences; abduction and kidnapping girls for various
purposes being punishable in sections from 364 to 369, offences related
to marriage being subjected to penal provisions in sections from 493 to
498; outraging the modesty of a woman in section 354 and insulting the
modesty in section 509 being offences. Section 314 makes causing
miscarriage without women’s consent, a punishable act. The Criminal Law
(Amendment) Act, 1993 (No.43/83) provided for in camera trial of rape
cases and also enlarged the scope of rape cases by placing the burden of
proving innocence on the accused persons apart from making penal
sections more mordant, particularly in cases of custodial rapes by
public servants. The Suppression of Immoral Traffic in Women and Girls
Act, 1956 with the Suppression of Immoral Traffic in Women and Girls
(Amendment),Act, 1986 and rules framed by states u/s 23 of the Act deal
with offences relating to immoral traffic in women and girls.
Sensitization of the people and the government in the recent past to the
ground-realities has brought sea-changes in the status of women. Rise in
female education as noticed in the first decades of the present century
opened up the aboideau of the resistance to sexual discrimination.
Though the process was very slow in principio , it gradually picked up
pace as decades passed by. Nineteen- seventies is a watermark in the
process. The advent of Mrs. Indira Gandhi in 1966 and the grit and
strength displayed by her as the Prime Minister of India and as the only
real woman among the parliamentarians of the time, revolutionised the
concept of womanhood in India. It became a fashion even in tiny villages
of India to comfort while a female baby was born, that who knows, the
child may also become a Prime Minister or somebody big like her. Though
India have innumerable valiant queens in its history who led huge armies
against formidable armies and fought jusqu au bout, they were
out-of-turn phenomena at their respective times and seldom touched the
chords of the women among the commoners. But, Mrs. Indira Gandhi was a
product of the time, of the process of the awakening of the women, and
in turn, as a phenomenon, she greatly contributed for the advancement of
the process.
The Indira Gandhi phenomenon helped to improve the status of women in

India in another way. It crumbled male chauvinism. It humbled male
pride. The historical cowerings of great leaders of India of the time
before Mrs.Indira Gandhi exposed the halo of the male superiority as
hollow. It made it patent that it is the power one weilds that makes the
difference, not the sex of the person who weilds it. Indeed, these are
subtle realisantions that shook the thoughts of the people though none
said it in so many words to them. Rise of Mrs. Indira Gandhi, sine
dubio, will remain as a meith in ameliorating the status of women in the
annals of Indian history.
The trend of women going for jobs and pursuing professions started far
before the advent of Indira Gandhi at the centre-stage. Her advent
revolutionised the trend. After Indira Gandhi, women in jobs became more
a rule than an exception and they looked for progressively higher slots
and sought fields where never before women stepped into. As a result,
more and more fields and higher and higher slots opened up for them. As
time passed by, the reservations towards recruiting or promoting women
thinned and ultimately disappeared. As a result, sexual discrimination
in jobs is a matter of past now. More and more people realise that is
skill and other abilities that count in doing a job well and not the sex
of the performer. As far as jobs are concerned., sexual equality is a
reality already.
Economic strength generated by jobs has successfully boosted the

self-Image of women in India. Economic liberation is the touch-stone of
all other liberations. The power, status and influence generated from
the jobs add to the solidification of the status of women in emerging
India. Evils like dowry are bound to be wiped out of the earth of India
in the emerging atmosphere. Being an evil, inveterate in Indian soil
from millenniums, a historical process like deracinating the assuetude
of dowry cannot take place overnight. Such a historical process takes
its own time. And emerging India happily is on the road. It is only a
matter of time before India is free from the prise of this shameful
menace.
Dowry death cases have become sensational topical issues these days with
the public being highly sensitised to the menace of the offences with
the unfortunate swelchie of cruel practices and circumstances deliver an
innocent girl at death’s door. All institutions of society including the
government, press, women’s organisations, judiciary and police handle
dowry death cases on a special footing. Each such case outrages the
patience of thinking people and rouses the passion and outcry against
the perpetraters of the offence. The police too give special importance
to the investigation of these cases and closely supervises the
investigation process..
Marriage is often called the second birth in a girl’s life; it brings an

entire metamorphosis in the form and contents of her life and in the
process exposes her to inopinate adaptation problems. It is an irony of
nature and social customs that it is the woman who is delicate in nature
rather than the man, who is selected for this difficile gauntlet of
transformation in the process of familial socialising. Percase, the
gentle and amenable caractere of the female breed expose hers to the
natural selection for the purpose. In the process death of the most
unfortunate of them by felo de se or homicide because of the grind of
the circumstances has become an unfortunate phenomenon. Dowry is only
one though primus interpares among various immane manifestations of
adjustment problems to which the tender psyche of a young girl is
exposed after her marriage. An integrated approach to all these symptoms
of adjustment problems to which a girl is suddenly exposed while her
persona is yet unprepared to meet the gauntlets alone can bring
deliverance to the fairer sex of the human genre. The entire process of
social legislations and their enforcement is only a distant link in the
whole catena of luctation warranted to achieve this end.
The emerging sexual equality has another happy face vis a vis the
conceptual reality of the reverence and importance given to women in
India and Indian culture from times immemorial. The equality of man and
woman on the field certainly tilts the balance of advantage in favour of
woman because of the favour with which she is accustomed to be seen.
This tilt of balance is not a forced one on the man, but one volunteered
hors de combat because of the natural attributes of a woman’s
characteristics . This tilt is already in evidence. Given equal chances,
woman is favoured in recruitments and promotions because of her natural
sincerity, honesty and devotion to work. In this sense, women are
overtaking men. The process is on. They are in limine. It is a happy
development. It is civilisation. It is culture. It is good for the
future of the humanity. Humanity can survive only if women with their
far superior attributes, lead men en face in addition to being driving
forces en arriere. Man sans woman is not only incomplete, but also
lightless and lifeless
Not that woman and man are really equal. Nature meant them to be unequal
for its own purposes and process. Basically, they are in-comparable
quantums, separate entities by themselves. If to be compared at all,
woman has an edge over man. Often the reality is distorted by man by his
brutish physical strength as against the gentle mental and spiritual
attributes of woman and he forcibly cornered all opportunities of
growth. If women are opened up to their de jure opportunities, women as
nature designed it for them, go ahead of men and lead them to a far
better world then existing now. A cultured and civilized world must
provide this natural opportunity to its women-folk for its own good.
This is what is happening in emerging India.
SOCIAL JUSTICE
Professor B.Kuppuswamy in his book “ Social Change in India” apropos of
‘ Paradox of the Indian Situation Today’ writes, “ On the one hand there
is a conscious, deliberate effort to change the social structure as a
result of the assimilation of new social values. Because of the struggle
for political freedom and the desire for economic reconstruction, new
social justice and equality of opportunity. On the other hand, there is
the fear that the old social values are being repudiated and destroyed
by the values of social justice and equality, which pose a challenge to
the past privileges based on caste, aristocracy, age, sex etc. The farm
labourer, the factory worker, the student, and women are repudiating the
authority which denied them social justice and equity”. This perennial
conflict between privileged and non-privileged, of reactionaries and
revolutionaries is the mark of a zoetic society. The clash of interests
and values steeped in an instinct for survival is the hall-mark of
social change. It is here the state comes into the picture as the
arbiter elegantium, as a beacon to guide both the pace and path of
social change through public education and legislation. The social
awakening which is possible through public education is sine qua non for
social change which can only be formalised through legislation as a
statutorily accepted social value to make its violation a criminal act.
A good piece of legislation backed by effective enforcement works as
catalytic agent in the process of social change.
SOCIAL CONFLICTS
Peter Worsley in ‘ The Third World’ writes “ In those countries which

fail to achieve the take-off and relapse into the hungry frustrations of
stagnation or regression, all kinds of conflict from anarchic protest to
regional schism or even communist revolution could flourish. A
revolutionary leadership could easily replace those nationalist parties
which have lost their social reforming zeal”. The state can be
impervious to the ascensive zeal for social reform only at its own
peril. Social inequality and social injustice as starting points of a
vicious circle wherein they are perpetuated cannot be the situation a
welfare state seeks to protect from the dynamics of positive change
which as a natural force of unending frustration expresses by peaceful
means in principo and by violence as dernier ressort if the state errs
by protecting the vested interests of inequality and injustice and fails
to discharge its responsibilities towards positive social change.
SOCIAL AWAKENING IN INDIA
The veteran journalist Shri.D.R.Mankelkar in his book titled “ A

Revolution of Rising Frustrations” beautifully analyses the situation of
ascensive social awakening in India. “ The fact is that the worm is at
last turning, falsifying the prophets who have averred that the Indian
masses are too underfed, too lethargic, and too fatalistic to rebel
against their fate and violently wrest from the rulers their elementary
human right-the right not only to survive but to improve their lot. “
The new awakening roused the esurient expectations of the long-repressed
and infested segments of the gens de peu and fomented their neoteric
hopes of being extricated from age- old repression. The government of
democratic India responded favourable to the aspirations of the infaust
segments of its populace, non obstante the not-so-inopinate resistance
from the privileged lobbies, by enacting legislations with the potential
for far-reaching changes towards establishing social isonomy and
justice. However , the zest in enacting the legislations is not amated
by the political will to enforce them, though some isolated attempts
were made here and there. Experience in the field dictates that some
thought should go to the modalities of the social legislation and their
enforcement to make the whole process genuinely effective as a vehicle
for faster growth towards social equality and social justice.
CHALLENGES OF SOCIAL EQUALITY
As French thinker Auguste Compte noted, a nouveau regime can emerge only
if man assumes responsibility for his actions and makes his own society.
The changes in social institutions do not occur by themselves, but by a
positive moral desire and commitment in that direction. This active
aspect of social change manifests in intellectual assertions for
deliberate social legislations and their effective enforcement. The
theory of “ Challenge and response” as expounded by the great British
historian Arold Toynbee, points out that a society can grow if it can
constructively respond to challenges. The challenges are often social
and internal and every civilisation as a facet of the society can learn
from the failings of quondam civilisations. Active responses to the
extant gauntlets of social equality and social justice against the
background of nonfeasance should be the foundation on which social
legislation and its enforcement mechanism should be broadly based.
SOCIAL JUSTICE VS LEGAL JUSTICE
Social justice is imprimis an informal social process rather than a

formal legal procedure. It is the moral standard of a society to which
its laws and actions conform. The injustices and legal disabilities
against certain sections of the society enshrined in many rules of
Indian society in bygone days are now a matter of the past. It is only
now that the need of liberty, equality, security, freedom from want,
fear and frustration as parameters of social justice are realised.
Social justice ex consequenti demands preferential treatment for the
socially backward and repressed classes who are at a disadvantage in
respect to others.
SOCIAL LAWS AS ‘CLEANSING FORCES’
Johan Galtung defines “ Structural violence” as “ The dominance of one

group over the other with subsequent exploitative practices” in “Peace
Thinking”. The pirlicue of this statement implies that preferential
treatment by the state to certain segments of the society to superate
its dominance by the others becomes at the outset an act of injustice
and structural violence by the state. However as Jerome Skolnick
preconsied, violence is a louche muticous term whose meaning is
established through political process, ipso facto acts of institutional
violence are comme il faut if perpetrated by the state in the larger
interests of the society as they fall beyond the ambit of the concept of
violence. Frantz Fanon, an African Psychologist in “ The Wretched of the
Earth” calls violence intended to restore self-esteem and do away
tyranny as ‘ Cleansing Force, Jean-Paul Sartre confirms the idea when in
Preface to Fanon’ he says, “ Violence, like Achilles’ lance, can heal
the wounds that it has inflicted”, indeed while it is institutional
violence in society’s interests.
SOCIAL JUSTICE IN INDIAN CONSTITUTION
The Indian Constitution in its preamble preconises social justice and

quality of status and opportunity to all the article 14 constates
fundamental rights while it declares that the state shall not deny to
any person equality before law, or equal protection of the law. The
Article 15 interdicts any kind of discrimination on grounds of caste,
creed, sex, birth etc. However, the Constitution recognised the
inadequacy of legal eqality in meeting the exigencies of social justice
when it recognised the necessity of special measures to uplift socially
deprived segments and constates in sub-section (4) of Article 15 that
the constitutional provisions do not prevent the states from making any
special provision for the advancement of any socially and educationally
backward classes of citizens or the scheduled castes and scheduled
tribes. This exception in the constitution to legal isonomy is the
cornucopia of most social legislations intended to misprise the crude
ancien regime and usher in a dream world of social equality and social
justice.
SOCIAL LAWS
Law is an instrument of both the continuity of social behaviour and of

social change. Manu had said, “ Immemorial custom is transcendent law”
Social consuetudes metamorphose into social laws in rerum natura and
perpetuate social customs. Professor B.Kuppuswamy in his book “ Social
Change in India” writes about two functions of the law according to this
view is social control and the major problem of law is to design the
legal sanctions to minimise deviances and to maintain social stability.
According to the other view, law could be more dynamic. It has not only
the function of social control but it has also to bring about social
change by influencing behavior, beliefs and values”. The social laws of
India are devised to bear the kiaugh of the dynamic function of bringing
about social change by influencing behavious, beliefs and value in
addition to social control. In Indian society where social inequalities
more suo, form the bedrock of living for historical reasons and embedded
in the Indian psyche as consuetudes and basic social rules more majorum,
the awakening and metabasis to new values of social equality and social
justice from the deep slumber of a millennium are not easy to come by.
Though isolated calls for certain changes are heard mostly from the
self-made spokesmen of the oppressed classes because of the influences
of liberal western thoughts, the albatross of orchestrating these
thoughts to the mosaic of the laws of the land falls on the government.
Social laws function as catalysts of social change in the Indian
situation.
SOCIAL CHANGES THROUGH LAWS IN INDIA
Most of the important social laws were enacted in India in the face of
plangent opposition from reactionaries inveterated in the terra firma of
the past practices. The queasy practice of polygamy was made hors la loi
and divorce was legalised by the Hindu Marriage Act of 1955. The
barbarous praxis of untouchability was made punishable by enactment of
the Untouchability (Offences) Act in the same year in conformity with
Article 17 of the Indian constitution. The Hindu Succession Act of 1956
is a meith in bringing daughters on pariel with sons in a respect of
property inheritance. The Hindu adoption and Maintenance Act of 1956
straightened the position of women in regard to the right to adopt. The
Dowry Prohibition Act of 1961 tried to deliver nubile colleens from the
menace of dowry. The Factory Act of 1948 raised the minimum age of
workers to 14 years and provided for annual medical examination of minor
workers. The Employment Exchange Act of 1959 provided for state help to
unemployed citizens to get jobs. The children Act of 1960 provided for
special care of children. All these incipient legislations of
independent India on social matters were enacted as vindicated by the
directive principles of state policy in line with the fundamental rights
enunciated in the Indian Constitution. Article 24 of the Constitution
sui juris interdicted employment of children below 14 years of age in
factories.
British India too saw much of the momentous legilsations conducive to

change and social justice. The Sati prohibition Act 1829, the Hindu
Widow Remarriage Act of 1856, the Female Infanticide Prevention Act of
1870 , the Special Marriage Act of 1872 providing for civil marriages
and inter-caste marriages as amended in 1923, the Child Marriage
Restraint Act of 1929 the Payment of Wages Act of 1939 providing for
regular payment of wages, the Industrial Dispute Act of 1929 providing
for settlement of disputes, the Trade Union Act of 1926 which legalised
trade unions the Workmen’s Compensation Act of 1923 providing for
compensation to workers for accidents, disablements and death on duty,
the Act of 1922 defining a child and preventing a child below 12 years
for employment, the Act of 1931 and its 1946 amendment reducing hours to
work a week are major keeks to social change via social laws.
The trend to usher social change through new legislations or amendments

to old ones is en train even in this neoteric age. The Debt Relief Act
of 1976, the Bonded Labour Abolition Act, the Protection of Civil Right
Enforcement Act of 1976 and amendments thereon, the 1983 amendments to
the Dowry Prohibition Act are important instances of such a nisus.
SOCIAL NORMS AND SOCIAL LAWS
Whenever the enactment of law is consectaneous to a change in social

norms, the law as a device of legal sanction against deviations
there-from, succeeds in legalising these neonate social norms. However,
the law proves ill-equipped and falls into desuetude while it seeks to
introduce intempestive social norms as a means of social justice for ‘
forced compliance’ as Festinger called it in An Analysis of Compliant
Behaviour’. The paradigm is the law regarding dowry and child marriage
being not as effective as that pertaining to monogamy for lack of social
force behind it.
WHERE INDIAN POLICE IS HEADING?

History of Indian police on modern lines dates back to the dawn of the
19th century. East India Company controlled police activities in areas
under its charge through Village Police Regulations. Post-sepoy mutiny
saw enactment of laws to streamline police organisations at provincial
levels. Enactment of the Police Act, 1861 as Central Act V in 1861 is a
major step in streamlining police organisations and their activities at
the central level. The Act which calls itself as “ An Act for the
regulation of police” preconises at its Preamble that…”it is expendient
to reorganise the police and to make it a more efficient instrument for
the prevention and detection of crime”. The Act seeks to establish one
police force under a State Government and its Preamble declares
prevention and detection of crime as the objective of the force.
POLICE UNDER BRITISH CROWN
Periods sinsyne saw ascensive use of the police force for suppressing
freedom struggle and maintaining law and order au reste prevention and
detection of crime. Indian police metamorphosed to a law and order
outfit in the next nine decades au contraire to the proclamations of the
Preamble of the Police Act, 1861. British Raj ruled India on the
strength of police force during the turbulent periods of the independent
struggle. In the process, law and order functions came to centrestage in
the charter of priorities of the police duties at the cost of the
objectives of prevention and detection of crimes.
A MAJOR TURNING POINT
Indian independence marks a major turning point in the history of its

police. The event marks the transition of India police from a colonial
heritage to a democratic character. The change has momentous impact on
the spirit, character and objectives of the organisation. The basic
interests of a colonial police is the perpetuation of the colonial rule
wherein matters ectogeneous to the interests are treated secondary. In a
democratic police, the foremost objective is upholding the interests of
the country, its people, its democratic heritage and the sanctity of the
constitution. This is a formidable responsibility. Maintenance of order,
rule of law, security of the people, safety of the national properties
and interests, prevention of offences and investigation of crimes sit
squarely on the sturdy shoulders of a democratic police. Its allegiance
shifts from the rulers in a colonial rule to the people, the interests
of the country and its constitution in a democracy. The shift is basic
to the character, job culture, functional values and the organisational
gestalt of the police force.
WORLD-WIDE TRENDS
The cardinal question is how far Indian police in the democratic

ambience worked –out its adaptations to the new situation and zeit
geist. Half-a-century should suffice for a fair and complete assessment.
The developments Indian police underwent in this period can either be
due to the world-wide developments in the field of policing and police
system as a continuing process or due to the adaptation of Indian police
from the colonial heritage to the democratic vintage. The evolution in
world-wide policing practices and police system in the latter half of
the 20th century itself is portentous. National security activities
gained primacy neck and shoulder above the crime and law and order
functions. With it came the grey areas of clandestine operations across
the countries. Police shed their uniforms and threw laws and morals to
the wind in pursuit of national security policy. They became
international players, hopping from country to country in disguise,
committing murders, overthrowing governments, forging passports,
shipping weapons, training rebels, spreading, disaffections, organising
violent protests etc in the interests of their own countries.
SECURITY CONSCIOUSNESS
Indian police could not lag behind. Moving pari passu with the world
trend is basic for survival. The consequence was the rising prominence
of security activities at the cost of both the prevention and detection
of crimes and the law and order functions. A craze for VIP and VVIP
securityis the Indian manifestation of the new security consciousness.
World-wide rise in terrorism gave way for specalisation in
anti-terrorist operations all over the world. Crack-forces became the
spine of the security police. Anti-hijack squads were organised as an
elite force of the police. Advances in science and technology made
national security a high-tech field. Satellites, modern communication
systems, high resolution photographics, laser beams , night vision
systems, computer technology etc made national security highly advanced
and comlex operations. The international developments only marginally
touched Indian police for lack of will to be a major player in
international clandestine warfares. The only real concern of Indian
police more suo in the last half century was VIP and VIPs security. Here
too, performance did not match the concern as many of its important
leaders including those occupied top positions of Prime Minister and
Chief Minister fell prey to assassins. Indulgence of Indian police in
form in lieu of substance, in number in place of efficiency and in
display where subtle moves were en regle led to the grave failures. The
popular axiom of Indian police to this day is that larger the number,
better the security. Motto is countering security threats with counter
threats; or better, meeting security gauntlets with the show of muscle
power. The approach is the antithesis of modern perceptions and theories
of security policing. In Indian ambience, VIP security has become a
fanfaronade; a procession of sound, light and motions; a festive
assemblage. Tragically, it is happening at the cost of law and order
functions and more so, at the cost of prevention and detection of
crimes.
MUSICAL CHAIR
The situation is tardier in law and order functions. Obvious powers and
tremendous avenues for illgotten money make law and order jobs hotly
sought after posts. Politicians and people in power are the bestowers of
these jobs on favourite few. Result is the desperate concours of police
officials of all ranks to aggrace politicians and people in power to
corner right spots in the musical chair. The ragmatical situation leads
to law and order functions losing the edge of fairness and objectivity
in efforts to keep right people in right side. This is how law and order
police become law for themsleves or for their political masters against
the raison d’etre of a law and order machinery. The situation breeds
corruption and encourages partisan policing. Law and order duties being
closely interlinked with the everyday life of the people, police on the
duties come in contact with them everyday and present the image of the
entire police force. The hors la loi image, corruption, inefficiency,
meekness before the mighty, insensitivity, arrogance and immanity to the
hoi polloi, these are the cornerstones of the epinosic image, the law
and order police spawned for the benefit of the Indian police.
LOSS OF CREDIBILITY
Fences itself grazing the field in law and order policing led to the
debasement of moral values in public life. Money power became the
effective counterpeise against the arms of the law and the state power.
Making money by any means became the secret of success. Frauds and
corruption became lucrative business. Governance was commercialised and
State power became a venal commodity. Administration process became a
scelerate and police lost credibility. People were forced to pursue
illegal and unwholesome means in their dealings with the State and the
police for survival. Laws as means of the state power became loathsome
objects for the commonman. This spread unrest and protests and violent
agitations became the order of the day. The people and the police found
themselves pitted against each to break the other. Violent protests led
to violent suppressions by the police. Hatred spawned hatred and
violence begot violence. This is where India stands today. Violence by
dalits, attacks by Naxalites, terrorism in Punjab and Kashmir, gangawars
in Bombay and Bangalore, lawlessness in Bihar and UP or enlevements by
ULF activists speak of the symptoms of the same malady namely
lawlessness in the law and order police that divellicate from its raison
d’etre.
CHARTER OF PRIORITIES
The pressure of law and order functions and importance of VIP security
sidelined prevention and detection of crimes to a minor responsibility
in the charter of priorities of the Indian police. Preventive techniques
saw no updating from the mechanical motions of the pre-independent
vintage. Prevention is forgotten in the pressure of other works. Indian
police come to picture only after a crime is committed for detection.
Here again, investigations are hijacked by political and money muscles.
CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM
Too many cases under investigation with investigators is a serious

misease of Indian crime investigation field. Work-pressure leads to
cursory investigation. Third degree methods are adopted for easy
results. The malfeasance itself is a black-mark on Indian criminal
justice system. Corruption and political pressures lead to miscarriage
of justice. Cases are taken up for investigation, investigated and
chargesheeted according to political conveniences. Bails, arrests,
searches, pace of investigation and timings of the chargesheet or final
report are subject to the equation between the head of the investigating
team and the head of the government. This is the situation at all levels
including the premier investigating agency of the country. Case diaries
were tampered at highest levels before sent to courts. Intentions of
chargesheeting political heavyweights were declared to media before
legal compulsions of such a sensitive act was met. Cases of political
significance were chargesheeted on filmsy grounds and later equitted by
the court. Inaction in some cases in part of the apex investigating
agency of the country led courts to monitor investigation of the cases
and warn of contempt proceedings for noncompliances. The apex court of
the country observed about the conduct of the heads of the premier
investigating agency of the country that “there appears to be too many
officers bitten by the publicity bug…Inefficiency appears writ larger
than performance.” When the head of the agency was removed from his
position for misdemeanour, the media of the country fished in the
troubled water to sensationalise the issue; the apex court was
constrained in the matter to observe that his removal should have come
earlier. This is the egarement to which Indian police condemned its
criminal justice system.
INDIFFERENT POLICE ADMINISTRATION
There should be a single root for the general fall of standards in

Indian police. It is insensitive and indifferent police administration,
lacking in all branches of administration, be it planning, organisation,
cooridnation, direction, execution, control or research and development
mechanism. The cause of atrophy lies more in negative schemings than in
lack of a positive face. Haphazard organisational growth as responses to
the time to time pressures sans elements of foresight and detailed
planning, corruption in selection and recruitment procedures, sham
training practices, non-existent inter-branch coordination, apocryphal
infrastructure, directionless directions, self-serving decisions,
deviant control mechanisms, perverted assessments and farcical research
and modernisation programmes have all added to the poor standards of
Indian police today. Huge budget allocations made for police are
want-only frittered away without accountability. Precious human
resources are wasted away with frivolous and mischievous games in career
planning programmes sans thought or seriousness. The culprits of these
shoddy affairs vary from the top-brass of the police to the
fonctionnaire in the government to the so called professional outfit,
the egregious Union Public Service Commission. Incompetence is writ
large in their approach to police administration. Their failures and
mischiefs in managing human resources seriously affect the interests of
an organisation based on human resources like the police.
GLIMMER OF HOPE
Not that all is bad. Occasional good works are there. The role of Indian
secret police in liberation of Bangladesh is the tour de force of Indian
clandestine operations. So to lesser extents are the successes in
containing activities of LTTE cadres and Sikh and Kashmiri militants.
India showed considerable presence of mind in Afghanistan front also.
The fear of law and a semblance f order, the law and order machinery
could infuse in a country of India’s size itself is a matter of credit
and pride to Indian police. The unshaken trust of the plebeian on the
criminal justice system of the country nonobstante the extant maelstrom
in the field per se is its apogee and speaks volumes about the utility
of police investigation in controlling crime.
What is distressing is that what is done is far short of what is

expected from Indian police. No country can afford to have an apollyon
in its midst in the shape of a corrupt, inefficient and disorganised
police force. Right leadership at the top can be the lever de rideau to
bring the system to its professional senses. Such a leadership in police
should rise ab intra from the very womb of the degenerate system by
rupturing the womb. The walls of the womb are hard and thick in police.
That is why the apotropaic process takes a long time. Till then, Indian
police must boil in the broth of its own ignominy.
VALUE SYSTEM IN INDIAN BUREAUCRACY

The word ‘value’ from the French root valoir suggests a sense of worth
as rising from the innards of the conscience. The perception of a given
value varies with the variae lectiones of the amoebic milieu. The
dependence of the value structure on milieu is the source of all the
corrida de toros of the human world. The value system of an individual
and an organization of which he consciously or by compulsion is a part
are rarely identical. This basically is the source of all human
conflicts. This is more so in the present age of accrescent entoilment
of human activities. Nowhere in the extant world, the conflict of value
systems is found as obvious as in the behemoth of the Indian
bureaucracy. That is why people with a strong conscience find themselves
in cul-de-sac in government service unless they adapt personal value
structures to the needs of the bureaucracy that is mediocre at the best
and criminal at the worst.
CONTRARIOUS VALUES:
The value system in bureaucracy is bifarious: inherent values and
survival-oriented values. The two facets of the same value system
further metagrobolise the complexity of the value system of the
bureaucracy ab intra. Add apocryphal elements in the garb of values
natural to the Indian bureaucracy to the broth, the field is ready for
all the dramas of this world.
A person’s locus standi in the affairs of his life is subject to his

position in the mélange of these often contrarious values at diverse
ambiences. Adamantine commitment to a value has no place here. Skeely
manoeuvring of positions from time to time, unfortunately, decides the
success in life. If value is understood by its true definition, the
extant formula of flexibility for success is nothing but refutation of
the concept of values per se. This is the ineluctable fact of life to
which human activities have devolved themselves. An illustration
suffices to make the point clear.
A young officer in 1960s began his career in a South Indian state with
commitment to the high values of public service laced with strictness
and discipline of very high order au naturel to his age and the nascent
stage of his career. He was a terror to wrong-doers in 1970s as a
district level executive officer and proved very successful in his work.
His unimpeachable integrity as also no-nonsense mien rendered him
unpopular among both subordinates and superiors. He was removed from his
district posting in less than a year on the pressures of the vested
interests and never found a responsible posting sinsyne with a profile
in official records as immature inter alia. His failure lay in his
individual value system not being attuned to what the bureaucracy
expected of him.
SURVIVAL INSTINCT:
Being enervated by the developments and angst-ridden, he realized that
he has no future in the career with his own convictions and values. This
turned him so much inward that he became proficient in psychology and
soon got doctorate in the subject. He did everything to reconcile his
traits and nature to the imperatives of the bureaucratic values. He went
out of his way to please everybody and made it his habit. The changes
found favour with none with the aura popularis yet defying him and he
went on losing mainstream postings as rose in rank and even remained
without posting for nearly a year in 1990s at a very high rank on the
suspicion of gross negligence in discharge of duties leading to a
serious disaster as a consequence of his newly acquired traits of
casualness. With the ablet, his nature saw the affret of enthusiasm to
please the political leadership of the state a toute force as he
approached the benchmark of the selection to the post of the head of the
department. As the popular perception continued to be against him as a
candidate for the coveted post, the energumen began to play the caste
card with the political leadership a corps perdu. His efforts to
undermine the chances of a senior backfired as the latter after
retirement as the head of the department filed cases against the former
succeeding him as the departmental chief. The point is that the officer
succeeded in heading the department as the altaltissimo of his career
though for a short period by the surgery he performed on his persona,
convictions and innate values. Though flexibility paid, one wonders
whether the quid pro quo was worth the surgery and could not he be a
person more in harmony with himself if he had continued with his
pristine value system avec acharnement. His predecessor is another
example of the same process but for that that after finding failures of
the new values to provide the aex triplex he needed, he took recourse
back to his innate values and won court battles to head the department.
CRISIS OF VALUES:
The tragedy of the officer was that the process of the changes found him
shedding away truly noble values innate to him. His integrity became a
disaster in the process. His name as the Managing Director of the
state’s Tourist Development Corporation in 1980s was linked to his young
PA after he was noticed spending long hours with her under locked doors
and irregularly elevating her to officer’s rank to the consternation of
the entire staff that went on state-wide strike against the Managing
Director. He was also suspected of wrong-doings in purchase of hundreds
of cars by the Tourist Development Corporation to run as tourist cars.
It clearly is a case of honest besoin to adapt to the imperatives of the
bureaucracy for survival going awry. The attempts are justifiable on the
grounds of the survival instinct basic to human nature, because the
bureaucracy as it is has no value for anything extra muros. It
recognizes only its values and remains adamantine to anything
ectogenesis. Therefore, the choice for a principled officer is between
an unsuccessful career for adhering to one’s own values and convictions
or quitting. Good jobs are difficult to come. Ergo, ordinary mortal’s
survival instincts lead to sacrifice his values and principles to adapt
to the requirements of the bureaucracy at any cost to the self and its
convictions. Everybody cannot be a saint. Thus the need to adapt own
values to the bureaucratic imperatives is ineluctable until Indian
bureaucracy grows to be mature enough to accept and absorb higher values
ab extra.
XENOPHOBIA:
A process of ossification has set-in in Indian bureaucracy in absence of
real growth and evolution after independence. The political leadership
find the development to its advantage. The bureaucracy found itself as
fish out of water when its leading guides returned to Britain after
independence. Those who handled the higher bureaucracy sinsyne followed
from where the British left with their own mediocre interpretations of
an ideal bureaucratic setup. The result is the extant bureaucracy of
India devoid of creativity, initiative, understanding and a sense of
public service. This reduced the definition of the public administration
to mean use of rules and procedures to delay or obstruct decisions or
actions just for the purpose of proving existence. The new setup
developed a queer xenophobia towards deviations from the set patterns as
a threat to the very existence of the bureaucracy. The mindset evolved
to a pernoctation against any fresh breeze ab extra and a tendency to
deracinate any move to that end in the bud itself. Nothing fresh can
leak-in to such a bureaucracy a huis clos.
BUREAUCRATIC CULTURE:
The indifference is limited to the values ectogenesis to the home-grown
value system. The three factors that exercise true prise on Indian
bureaucracy beyond the limits are caste affiliations, political
patronage and money power. They have become pollent values inter se. You
can buy practically anything from the present Indian bureaucracy with
them en arriere. And you find what virtually is hell on the Earth
without these factors to back you.
The bureaucracy of India in the last five decades has become a law to
itself with an opus musivum of a ribald culture spreading tentacles of a
reticulation of rights and wrongs beyond the reach of any known precepts
of decent human conduct. Here, power is the supreme deity that absterges
all sins, reasons and feelings. That naturally renders the rank in
bureaucracy the highest virtue and age, merit, character and human
dignity eat dust in the milieu. Such a bureaucracy is a perfect ground
for the growth of all types of evils and human weaknesses. There was a
Sanskrit scholar with moderate successes as a writer in a provincial
language holding a very senior post in the bureaucracy of a South Indian
state. He held huge functions for the release of his books by
dignitaries including the state Chief Minister. A junior who became
distinguished as a poet and as a writer decided to release his book
through the Governor of the state. The senior in the bureaucracy out of
sheer jealousy spread canards and exercised his personal weight to
ensure that the function was cancelled just twenty-four hours before the
release of the book by the Governor of the state. This is Indian
bureaucracy after independence in puris naturalibus.
POLITICAL LEADERSHIP:
The cardinal question is why the Indian political leadership tolerated
such an obstructionist bureaucracy for all these years. The reason is
that the political leadership finds itself comfortable with the ossified
and unenlightened bureaucracy. There is no danger of an enlightened
bureaucracy overshadowing it and taking all the limelight for positive
performances. On the other hand, an inert and unenlightened bureaucracy
is a handy tool to bear the burdens of all failures. An ineffectual
bureaucracy naturally brings higher stature to the political leadership
in public perception. It has become a fashion in India to blame the
political leadership for all evils of the country. The true blame for
the maelstrom the country finds itself with, must lay on the threshold
of the crippled bureaucracy and its blotched value system. Sine dubio,
Indian political leadership now is more enlightened than its
bureaucracy. The edge of the bureaucracy seen in pre-independent era is
no more evident now. The reason is that the political leadership kept
its doors open for fresh air and updated its value system from time to
time unlike the bureaucracy. While the bureaucracy rarely looks beyond
the edges of its desk and never outside the window, it is the political
leadership that navigated India through diverse innovative phases like
NAM, mixed economy, socialistic pattern of society, social control and
now economic reforms. Even the recent Agra Summit to bring peace to the
South-Asia region is a fine example of an innovative political
leadership.
An enlightened bureaucracy with a noble value structure is a great

blessing to any country. Unfortunately, Indian bureaucracy at all levels
flourish on the ruses like falling on each other to lick the boots of
the rich and powerful and bending double over to please the political
leadership or play the caste card. These ruses always payed a natura rei
in the ambience of the Indian bureaucracy after independence courtesy
the tendency of the political leadership to play the bureaucratic
minions against each other. This prevented the evolution of higher value
system in Indian bureaucracy.
Every setup strictly has its own culture and value system. An individual
perforce reconciles his personal values with that of an organization
when he chooses to be its part. He is required to sacrifice his own
convictions and values in the service of the larger interests of the
organization. The predicament is perficiently brought out by William
Butler Yeats in two lines of the poem, “An Irish Airman Foresees His
Death” when the airman sings,
“ Those that I fight I do not hate,
Those that I guard I do not love;”
Such a situation is common while organizational objectives and values
take precedence over individual objectives and values. The conundrum of
such a reconciliation lies in resorting to the adaptations while the
organization as in Indian bureaucracy suffered degringolade in its value
structure en face the higher value structure of the individual. The
ambience necessitates the individual lower himself to the lower world to
fit-in for survival with the full knowledge that he is becoming a lesser
human being in the process. That is the true challenge on the fresh
recruits to the government service in India who enter the services with
starry eyes and true commitment to the public service inspired ab imo
pectore and soon end-up perforce in the quagmire of conflicting values.
ROLE OF POLICE IN THE CAUSE OF SOCIAL JUSTICE
Article 15 (1) of the Constitution of India lays down that “ The State
shall not discriminate against any citizen on grounds only of religion,
race, caste, sex, place of birth or any of them”. Article 14 that speaks
about equality before the law or the equal protection of the laws.
Article 16 that speaks about the equality of opportunity in matters of
public employment and Article 17 that speaks about abolition of
untouchability are mere extensions and applications of the Article 15
(1). The Preamble of the Constitution identifies justice as social,
economic and political; and Equality as of status and opportunity. These
declarations of the Constitution provide the framework of social justice
of the Sovereign Socialist Secular Democratic Republic of India. The
principle of equality enjoined by the Constitution gains significance
vis a vis the long tradition of discriminations and exploitations in
India on the basis of religion, race, caste and sex. Indian Constitution
seeks to bring a halt to the vide through the State Power. Police is the
tool. Indian Constitution also seeks to establish economic equality.
Economic and social equality are inter-knitted with the cause of social
justice for the reason that economic status and opportunities more often
than not decide the position of religions, races, castes and sexes in
society.
ROLE OF POLICE
Police are called social doctors. They examine, diagnose and treat
misease in the body of the society through the administration of laws
and surgical operations. Discriminations and exploitations are the
deadly cancers that seize and disintegrate a society. Police are
duty-bound to keep these maladies under check. Their fight against the
evils of a long tradition and practices accepted by the society as
legitimate by the stamp of time is a protracted and frustrating struggle
against the convictions imbued deep into the psyche of the society.
Their role as the ultimate enforcers of social laws brings them
centrestage in the cause of social justice.
SENSITISATION AND SPECIAL SKILLS

Administration of social laws is a specialised task requiring
sensitisation to social issues and social justice and special skills
sine qua non for handling socially sensitive cases. Police handling
these cases have to be understanding and circumspect though tenacious
when circumstances warrant sans temulence of power and surquedry. These
operators should be kind and devoid of the malfeasance of immane police
methods, never forget that they are dealing with distinct issues which
are the outcome of historical reasons and special social situations,
that they are dealing with a wider social malady through the specific
symptoms in their hands for solution and ergo there are no villains in
the real sense of the term in the extant issues, that they are social
doctors interested only in excising cancerous growths from the society.
They have to be sensitive to human sufferings and committed to social
justice. These characteristics thought to be alien to police nature are
not easy to come to police unless recruitment process takes special care
to draw men of appropriate mental makeup to the force and their training
process is programmed to reinforce the characteristics. The police also
require periodical programmes to sensitise them to the cause of social
equality and social justice.
NEED OF CIRCUMSPECTION
Social injustices of discrimination and exploitation are committed by

the pollent on their weaker counterparts. This makes witnesses to crimes
reluctant witnesses for the fear of reprisals. The natural
resourcefulness of the police comes to the fore in handling such
obstacles. In a social situation where the exigencies of survival,
coexistence and security force rival parties to bury the hatchet and the
weaker of the two submit again to the tyranny of the pollent for the
sake of survival, commitment of the police to the goal of social justice
plays a crucial role in bringing offenders to the book and absterging
evils from the body of the society. However discreetness and
circumspection are the calves here. In nonserious cases where
possibility of exploitation in future is ruled out, rehabilitation and
compensation become important factors from the human side of the issue
and the need of a fair settlement gains ground. Police are required to
attend these problems with discreetness and circumspection in the best
interests of the society and justice. Ability to handle situations with
creative ingine is the core of the skill of handling socially sensitive
cases.
LOCUS STANDI OF ECONOMIC INEQUALITIES
Discriminations and exploitations based on race and caste take myriad

forms and shapes in India of a million races and castes, each
individually and in groups discriminating against the other. The main
strain of this discrimination is about 20% of the country’s population
specified by the President as Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes
under Articles 341 and 342 respectively of the Constitution being
discriminated against and exploited by forward communities.
Discrimination against and exploitation of have-nots by the well-to-do
is the elan of all discriminations of race. Caste and sex practised in
extant India. Power and strength make all the differences in this world.
Money, knowledge, mental ability, political power and muscle power
constitute real power and strength. Those who have access to these
powers and strength. Those who have access to these powers and strengths
come out successful irrespective of their race, caste and sex. It is the
weak and powerless irrespective of race, caste and sex are exploited
most. Weak and powerless sections of society in race, caste and sex are
discriminated against and exploited most. The police with their
statutory powers, laws, arms and weapons are in position to give spine
to the weak and powerless in discharge of duties towards social justice.
CONFIDENCE BUILDING
Police support to weaker sections can be physical and psychological.
Physical support covers aspects like providing protection, strict
enforcement of social laws and honest investigation to violations.
Psyhological support implies carrying out above responsibilities with an
added objective of creating a sense of confidence and well-being in the
exploited sections of the society. Making enforcements of social laws a
show-piece of deterrence also helps. The psychological aspect needs
emphasis in policing against social evils. Enforcing laws for its own
sake does not help tackling social issues. Involvement and participation
of the police with a sympathetic commitment to social justice is the
clavis. The immane approach of the rich and powerful to their weaker
counterparts has to be countered with the strong arm methods of the
state power through its tool of police.
CIVIL RIGHTS ENFORCEMENT
Civil Rights Directorates au reste the executive police bear the

responsibility of protecting the interests of the exploited races and
castes of the society. Police endeavour to guarantee strict enforcement
of the provisions of The Protection of Civil Rights Act, 1995 and the
Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes ( Prevention of Atrocities)
Act 1989 as amended from time to time and rules thereunder, au reste
keeping pernoctation on violations of constitutional safeguards and
protections to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. Police have
responsibilities to give relief under rules and laws pertaining to
bonded labour, debt relief and land grants. They are duty-bound to trace
the cases of misrepresentation of castes to knock off the benefits given
by the government orders pertaining to reservations to these groups of
the society. The responsibilities of the police is to ensure that really
weak and helpless among these weaker sections get maximum benefits of
the state protection and benevolence. The discreetness and
circumspection needed to make this task of social justice possible
cannot be indited in law and has to be exercised by the police by its
own commitment to the cause of social justice.
ATROCITIES AGAINST WOMEN
Rape, unnatural offences, dowry harassments, abduction, kidnapping,

outraging modesty, eves teasing, marriage offences, causing forcible
miscarriage and forcing to prostitution are the most common outrages
committed against women by the more powerful men. The discrimination and
exploitation accounts for about 50% of the population committing
injustices against the other 50% and for this reason assumes serious
dimensions as a social malady. Unlike offences against weaker races and
castes, most offences against women are punishable under the Indian
Penal Code; rape and unnatural offences come under sections from 375 to
377, abduction and kidnapping under sections from 364 to 369, marriage
offences under sections from 493 to 498, outraging the modesty under
section 354, insulting the modesty under section 509 and forcible
miscarriage under section 314. The Suppression of Immoral Traffic in
Women and Girls Act, 1956 and its amendment in 1986 with rules
thereunder deal with offences relating to immoral traffic in women and
girls. The Dowry Prohibition Act, 1961 with its amendments of 1984 and
1986 and rules thereunder deal with dowry harassments and dowry deaths
either by homicide or abetment to commit suicide caused against young
girls by their husbands, in-laws and their associates. The Criminal Law
(Amendment) Act,1983 (No.43/83) and The Criminal Law (2nd Amendment)
Act,1983 (No.46/83) brought further safeguards to women during the
investigation and trial of offences under immoral traffic and dowry
prohibition Acts. Dowry death cases have become sensational topical
issues these days with the public being highly sensitised to the menace
of the crime which deliver an innocent girl at the death’s door. Each
such case outrages the patience of thinking people and rouses passion
and outcry against the perpetrators of the crime. The police must give
special importance to the prevention and investigation processes of
these crimes.
Social justice is a glidder concept that changes its hues with time
depending on prevailing social norms and social values. No age has a
right to preconise its own norms and values as absolute and peremptory.
In this sense, every social law is passe and peregrine beyond its
immediate time frame. The deciduous nature of social laws necessiates
circumspect approach in their enforcement for the reason that mens rea
in the sense it is used in conventional offences may be absent in these
cases. The change of the face of social justice brings new social laws
with it. Police must go pari passu with these developments and
differentiate between justice and injustice selon les regles in force at
the time. Effective enforcement of social laws reinforces reigning
social norms and values by giving them the teeth of law. How it is done
depends on the commitment of the police to the cause of social justice
and equality.
REQUISITES OF GOOD GOVERNANCE

Governance is steering and guiding the country in its course by right
policies, decisions and actions and the apparatus invested with the
responsibility is government. A government may have different gestalts,
colours and priorities depending on the needs and circumstances of the
country at the time. Steering the rudder in proper direction through all
weathers constitutes the core of the governance. Those holding and
attending the rudder decide the destiny of the country. Their character,
attitudes and competence determine the tournure of the future of the
country and its people.
TWO TIERS:
Governance in a democracy is a bifarious exercise with the political
rung controlling the policy and decision-making apparatus while the
administrative rung handling the decision and action apparatus of the
governance. The political and administrative faces are the two sides of
the same coin of the governance. The political rung represents the will
and aspirations of the people. People get the politicians they deserve.
Any expectations and manipulations about the will of the people are
undemocratic au fond and unconstitutional even. The case is tout a fait
different with the administrative rung which functions as an interface
between the policies and its implementation and between the political
rulers and the hoi polloi in the matter of governance. While political
leadership is ephemeral VVIP guest-component in the arena, the civil
servants are the abiding framework of rules and procedures within which
the minutiae of the governance are conceived and built brick by brick.
It is these civil servants at diverse ranks, levels and fields that
really hold the rudder of the governance to steer the country in
whatever course their composite character and competence permit. The
true governance depends on their abilities and attitudes.
CIVIL SERVANTS:
They are professionals in the field of governance unlike the political
leaders who handle governance ens per accidens. They are career
administrators and specialists eo nomine by choice all their lives and
constitute more than 99% of the manpower in the field of governance. It
is they who by their conduct and attributes decide the nature of the
governance in the country and constitute the mainstay of the government
irrespective of what party comes to power and who control the reigns of
power. Karunanidhi as CM heaping corruption cases against and putting
former CM Jayalalitha behind bars and Jayalalitha reciprocating by the
same coin when she comes to power or Bofors gun case of the Congress and
Tehelka tape case of the NDA in the centre are all dramas of gratuitous
media hype of little significance to the future of the country until the
character of the administrative rung remains unchanged. The political
face can make really little change to the country. It makes little
difference to Bihar who heads the government until the civil servants
there change their character and mindset. It is unrealistic and too
simplistic to presume that the political leadership provides model to
the administration down the line. The bureaucracy of India is too
hardboiled a unit for such a quick change of colours. The reality is the
other way round. The political leaders who come to power have no
alternative but go d’ accord with the demands of the bureaucracy or
perish. Politicians as they are, do adapt to their survival instincts
and barter their visions for possible quid pro quo in power. The
bureaucracy in India really enjoys a commanding position in the
governance of the country.
WRONG ATTITUDES:
The tragedy of India is that their position and importance is not amated
by requisite qualities, merit, passion and commitment for effective and
good governance. The Indian bureaucracy is seized with wrong attitudes
and evils that waste it away ab intra. Competence has become a disaster.
Wrong people in wrong jobs is a serious malady enervating the public
administration of the day. Political heads are wrongly blamed for the
havoc. It is the bureaucracy for its own parochial ends at the cost of
the bureaucratic integrity and ideals that invite the trouble and guide
the political leadership in the evil path.
HUMAN ELEMENTS:
The extant bureaucracy ensemble is marked by lack of human concerns and
empathy for the fellow men. Being as rigid as rules and procedures of
which those in the bureaucracy are custodians of is wrongly accepted as
en regle for those in the bureaucracy. This has deprived the elements of
heart and compassion from the body of the bureaucracy. Initiatives,
novel ideas and creative pursuits are seen as the antithesis of the
governance. This has deprived the elements of brain and intellect from
the corpus of the public administrative system. The result is a
deadweight-bureaucracy weighing down on the live India and sucking it
dry with evils and misuse of the powers invested on it for governing and
steering the country ahead.
INTEGRITY:
India is an egregious forerunner in the world among countries most
corrupt in public life. The root cause of this grave malady is India’s
corrupt governance pregnant with inefficiency, indifference and gross
temulence of power devoid of human elements. Bureaucratic measures have
become synonymous in popular parlance and perception in India with
foolhardy decisions and actions far removed from reality. Lack of
accountability is the leitmotiv of governance in India. This is a
malengine consciously evolved ab intra to safeguard self-interests.
Power sans accountability rendered governance in India an evil per se.
INSENSITIVITY:
The evils of governance need not always be directed only against
outsiders. Inscience knows no boundaries. Even those within may become
cruel victims of its grossly unrealistic and farcical decisions as in
the case of a highly talented and multifaceted genius who joined
government service in 1978. He was soon recognized for sheer brilliance
and purity of character as a diamond that can fit anywhere and as a
peacock among the fowls. Soon the recognition itself turned a noose on
his neck. It was assessed by the inscient bureaucracy that his
outstanding attributes might prevent him from becoming popular among the
seniors and prevent him from reaching higher levels. A two-pronged
strategy was devised. He was to be roughed-up and denied promotions to
rub-off his superior qualities and the intimidating aura till the
detrition by the sufferings forces him down to the ordinary level. Once
the job is accomplished, his lost seniority was to be restored a few
years before retirement.
ATROCITIES:
He was denied promotions following the meretricious career plan year
after year till his junior colleagues became senior to him by two ranks.
He was posted to most humiliating posts and harassed endlessly. However,
the process got caught in a skein as the infaust officer refused to come
down from his immanent and really superior qualities even after two
decades of immanity and sufferings while the bureaucracy refused to
yield and give up its illegal and unconstitutional stance until the
officer condescends to the mediocre levels. The refusal of the officer
to approach judiciary against the ill treatment for redressal and his
resolve to depend solely on his talents and character helped the
establishment to persist with the preposterous process a corps perdu.
His morale remained en bon point and high throughout non obstante
serious humiliations and endless grief. He aequo animo sought refuge in
other fields and won nonpareil accolades from everybody by sheer
talents. His tormentors tout de suite followed him there too. The head
of the State Intelligence who himself a small-time writer and published
a few books in a regional language used esoteric threats in 2000 on the
publishers of the accurst officer to discourage them from publishing his
books. The publishers who already had published half a score books of
the officer returned a contre coeur two manuscripts of the officer in
sheer desperation a natura rei expressing helplessness en face the
police interferences.
TRANSPARENCY:
Fanciful premises bordering madness tout court leading to irresponsible
and eristic career plans of that dimensions are possible only in
governance utterly lacking in accountability and only a sacred country
like India can produce such gross grief, sufferings and humiliations eo
nomine noble intensions en pure perte. Lack of transparency makes such
etourdi atrocities possible and permits its practice for decades en
pantoufles as in the case study.
PUBLIC CAUSE:
The case is an eye-opener to how merit, talent and character of very
high order meted out by the mediocrity of the governance in the Indian
milieu. Jealousy is common. Anybody junior receiving limelight is seen
with resentment and suspicion. The major achilles’ heel of the
governance in India is its inability to understand others’ predicaments.
Governance in quiddity is safeguarding national interests and the
welfare of the people. These factors perforce involve empathy with the
people and sensitivity to their interests. These are the springboards of
good governance. No governance worth the name can render meaningful
public service sans the spirit of building bridges to the hoi polloi in
whose service it draws sustenance and what constitutes its raison d’
etre. Good governance must be built on the terra firma of human concerns
and sensitivity to others’ predicaments.
ACCOUNTABILITY:
Another requisite of good governance is accountability. It gives
sanctity to power and makes it meaningful and relevant in the scheme of
governance. Power is a raw energy. Accountability gives it
sophistication and purpose. Governance sans accountability has the
tendency of hijacking the country to the pit of evils that power breeds.
Checks and counterchecks serve the purpose of good governance by
rendering itself to the litmus test of accountability, ipso facto
bringing in the elements of responsibility to the field of governance.
In the ambience of civil servants functioning in the shadow of the
political leadership, the former mastered the art of evading
accountability and responsibility. The successes boldened them to the
derring-does of larger dimensions. The recent US-64 debacle is the
point. India can ill-afford repeat performances of that dimension and
must save from such disasters in future through an uneluctable parameter
of accountability that alone can dawn an era of responsible governance
in the country.
OBJECTIVITY:
A cardinal principle of good governance is objectivity and fair play.
The governance as public administration is inevitably circumvented by
pulls and counter-pulls of diverse kinds to influence decisions and
actions. The compulsions for yielding to either side are enormous and it
reduce the governance to a mere play or dynamics of lobbyists and
influence-pedlars. A good governance must stand up to the pressures.
This requires tremendous inner strength and singular commitment to the
public cause. It is easier said than done. However, this commitment is
sine qua non for good governance. While accountability is an apparatus
to protect the governance from the indulgences of the fonctionnaire ab
intra like greed, irresponsibility and love for easy life, the shield of
objectivity protects it from the ectogenous onslaughts of pressures,
temptations and threats. While accountability must evolve as an external
mechanism ingrained in the body of the governance, objectivity is an
inner faculty either inborn or acquired as the fond of good governance.
IMBALANCES:
Good governance should have its powers and responsibilities amated and
evenly distributed in the fabric of the governance. This ensures smooth
governance d’ accord with the principles of democracy. Another factor
core to good governance is a balance of powers and responsibilities
propped up with transparency in state affairs. Responsibilities sans
powers end up with failures in performance and powers non compris
responsibilities breed undue morgue and lead to harassment of the
public. Governance sans transparency is at the root of all evils and
goes tout au contraire to the very rationale of the democracy. It can
neither be fair nor earn the trust of the people.
OPEN MIND:
No governance is worth the salt without a passion for developmental and
welfare activities in national interests. The passion widens the
horizons of the mind as against that circummured by isms of theoretical
hang that can never provide a good and open governance. A passion pure
and clear for the welfare and development of the nation and its people
by any means is a prerequisite for good governance. Only that keeps mind
open for all developments worldwide and absorb really the best for the
country.
VISION:
The most basic requirement of any good governance is a vision, an
ability to look ahead to the future of the country with great
expectations and endless possibilities in sidelines. This is potential
of evolving the governance to greater heights to herald an era of
successes and prosperity. Visions carve paths to the future and prod the
governance to navigate along the course. It provides a break from the
quotidian plod in preference to innovative strides to fulfil the vision.
Governance sans vision is like building an edifice a tatons without a
plan or blueprint. It at best is a random erection. Vision gives
direction and purpose to the governance. It gives a grandeur and a
proportion to the process. No governance can be good and complete
without a vision to steer ahead and a true governance can be built only
on the terra firma of a vision. The old concept of a prosperous India is
based on the vision of “Rama Rajya”. The new concept of India coming of
age is based on the vision of a world power or a regional power in Asia.
Once a vision of that dimension is en arriere to back, it is easy to put
the pluses and minuses to conceive a strategy towards the end.
Otherwise, governance is nothing more than mechanical motions.
India in its long history saw governance of all kinds, proportions and
dimensions and survived through them. It saw the worst and the best in
its 2500 years of recorded history. It, like other old civilizations of
the world, has worked as the crucible of various experiments in
governance. The governance in India now is based on this long
experience. It is the collective will for good governance that is
lacking in India. The consequence is that the hoi polloi suffer and the
country fails to reach the height it is potential of. The besoin of the
extant India is the evolution of a collective will to have a good
governance. People must pool their energies to force a good governance
for the country. Indeed the job is not easy and the resistance from
those in charge of the governance whose interests lie in the status quo
is bound to be hard. But, this cannot be a reason to leave the matter of
this dimension unattended as the fate of one billion people depends on
this development. Only such a collective will can devolve truly good
governance for the country.

Policing The Police

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POLICING THE POLICE

Title of the Book: POLICING THE POLICE

A POLICE officer and a prolific writer, Praveen Kumar, has published

A police officer unravels his profession.

Policing with a cause. Policing The Police by Praveen Kumar.…….delves

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Born in Mangalore, Praveen Kumar

Stemming from his varied academic

OTHER BOOKS BY PRAVEEN KUMAR

THE WORK IS A BUNCH OF LILTING POEMS IN EASY, INTIMATE

METAPHORS AND WORLD IMAGERIES, REPLETE WITH RHYME

PRAVEEN KUMAR IS A POET, A PROLIFIC WRITER

THERE IS AN ELEMENT OF DELIGHT AND SURPRISE

POLICING FOR THE NEW AGE

THE LANGUAGE IS FLOWERY.....THERE IS A NEED TO

PUBLISHED WORKS OF PRAVEEN KUMAR

a) English writings 1) POLICING FOR THE NEW AGE (MAY 1992)

a) The Hindu (Open Page)

1) INDIAN POLICE AT A CROSSROADS (6-6-1995)*

b) The Indian Express (Editorial Page)

1) QUOTA SYSTEM CAN WEAKEN CIVIL SERVICE (6-6-1995)

c) Deccan Herald (Sunday Supplementary)

1) TOWARDS SANE SERVICE (2-7-1995)*

d) The Times Of India

1) THE GUN STILL SPEAKS (21-10-1995)

1) CRIME, POLITICS AND POLICE (FEBRUARY 1996)*

1) INVESTIGATION OF DOWRY DEATH CASES (1996 – 3)

1) Sanchaya (Bangalore DD) on 8-6-1992

1) Sanchaya (Bangalore DD) on 12-9-1989

1) Political Reforms in India (centre for Policy Research & BU) on

This book has another dimension. It, in certain aspects, interprets

Bangalore, Pratheek Praveen Kumar

"Policing the Police" is a sequel to my earlier book/Policing for the

Care is taken to emphasise certain core aspects of the discussion

I acknowledge with deep humility, the contribution of my father, Shree

October 29, 1999 - P.K.

Most of the available books are

“Policing The Police" is a departure

This book is different and outstanding as

Policing The Police

• Very few people are privileged to have

• The core - problem areas include

. Blaming the system or the values is an

. The book addresses such problems

What is Policing The Police?

• Policing the police involves self

• A valuable reference for

• The book stands out for the highest

• The author's close association with

Praveen Kumar is a police

Policing The Police is his

INNOVATIVE TECHNIQUES IN POLICING

Talks of innovative techniques presupposes a sound foundation. In the

1) CREATION OF A DISTINCT DETECTIVE CADRE :

Policing of the ancien regime was basically identified with crime

Creation of the distinct detective cadre ncessiates perforce the

2) POLICE STATIONS AS GRASSROOT POLICE SYSTEM:

A system is a functionally independent unit of mutually dependent

The police Inspector in charge of a police station in the new system

Two techniques that constitute the bedrock for transforming Indian

THE CORE OF POLICE PROBLEMS

It is preposterous to lay the blame on lack of resources or neglect of