Essay on Police accountability and commitment in India

Essay on Police accountability and commitment in India

Should the police be committed to law, or to political executive, or to people? My contention is that police should remain committed to none of these but only to the ‘role’ it is expected to perform. What is the difference in the four priorities and why is “commitment to role” given top priority?

The Police Act of 1861 requires the police to remain committed to the political executive. Senior and learned police officers like N.S. Saxena, (former Director General, CRPF, Delhi) expect police to remain committed to law.

The National Police Commission suggested that the police should be more concerned with protecting the interests of the people, i.e., it should remain committed to society. I hold that ‘role commitment’ on the part of the police is more important.

Everybody knows that our political rulers use and misuse the police for their vested interests. The unscrupulous self-seeking politicians abuse the strong arm of the police for their partisan ends.

Politicians always like to lord over the men in uniform. MPs and MLAs are quite often seen taking undue interest in the postings of SPs, DSPs, and even inspectors and constables in their constituencies so that they could help them not only in keeping an eye on their voters but also in protecting them in their illegal activities.

This has turned our police force into a tool for subverting the process of law, for prompting growth of authoritarianism and for shaking the very foundations of democracy.

Section 3 of the Indian Police Act of 1861 (which has not been reframed even after 135 years because of the vested interests of the political elite) says that the ‘superintendence’ of the police shall vest in and be exercised by the state governments and its administration in the Director General of Police.

At the district level, the administration of Police shall vest in the district superintendent under the general control and direction of the district magistrate. The degree of ‘superintendence’ by the state government or ‘directional control’ of the district magistrate intended to be exercised is not specified.

In practice, the state governments have been issuing executive instructions under Section 46(2) of the Act, which are contrary to the spirit of Section 3 of the Police Act. Many rules and regulations are framed by the state governments which amount to ‘interference’ which the law did not contemplate and which have been prejudicial to the interest of the police department.

In England, a police officer is considered an officer of the law. In India too, the judiciary expects our police to follow the rule of law. In the Hawala case, the Supreme Court had to direct the police to consider all people equal, irrespective of the position and status of the person.

Commitment of police to law would thus mean that the police have the inherent authority to flout the orders of their political houses if they considered such orders a barrier in maintaining law and order in society.

In a situation of this kind, if a superintendent of police wants to arrest a highly-placed bureaucrat for violating the law and if he is asked by the minister concerned not to do so, the superintendent of police will not bother to carry out the minister’s orders but arrest the officer concerned.

In 1984, the police wanted to arrest 26 persons in Aligarh (Uttar Pradesh) on the basis of police intelligence reports that they were likely to arouse communal feelings and start riots.

The politicians, however, ‘intervened’ and saw that these persons were not arrested. And when communal riots actually broke out, more than 20 of the 26 suspected persons were found involved in the riots.

This is an instance of commitment of the police to political bosses. Had the police been committed to law, they would not have bothered to obey the misconceived orders of their political bosses.

Now comes the commitment of the police to people or to society. In this case, even if the policemen have to deviate from the existing laws (as they always do in a large number of cases), they would do it not only for protecting the life and property of the people but also for bringing the most corrupt politicians and bureaucrats to the notice of the people and for arresting and prosecuting them in the courts.

No doubt, this is desirable, however; I would like to go a step forward and suggest; ‘commitment to role’ which surely is broader than ‘commitment to society’.

But if committed to ‘role’, the police will ignore the supremacy of the political elite, the supremacy of the rule of law, the supremacy of society’s interests, and surely take the desired action against the law-violator, giving importance-to their ‘role’.

This is what is expected of the police today. The concept of ‘police accountability’ has thus to change, keeping in view the new goals to be achieved. Let us hope that soon the role of police will be redefined and there would be a conscious effort to make it an instrument of service to the people.