Short notes on the working personality of policemen.

Short notes on the working personality of policemen in India.

Sociologists are familiar with the notion that a man’s occupation influences his personality. The varied conditions under which men earn their livelihood heavily influence their general perspectives on life and their modes of social participation. Keeping this point in mind, some features of policemen’s ‘working personality’ have been sketched.

Jerome Skolnick (Justice Without Trial, 1966: 42-70) has given the following features of policemen’s personality: suspiciousness, conservatism, cynicism, prejudices, defenders of status quo, lack of desire for rapid social change, and social isolation from others.

However, Robert Balch (Journal of Criminology, Criminal Law and Police Science, March 1972: 106) is of the opinion that there is no empirical evidence that the police can be distinguished by a particular personality type. Actually, a policeman is no different from the rest of the population. Policemen are very ordinary people who happen to be extraordinarily visible.

It is the elements of danger and authority which are central to police work that lead policemen to develop these characteristics. Police officers come to be especially attentive to unusual situations, for the unpredictable is also likely to be dangerous.

The dangerous aspects of their work and their task of compelling others to obey laws, many of which are unpopular with citizens, give rise to police solidarity and policemen’s remaining reserve in developing contacts with others. Mostly they are involved in interaction with one another rather than with most other occupational groups.

Why does the policeman become authoritarian? It is not as if only authoritarian types are recruited in the police system. The fact is, normal people, once in the system, tend to become authoritarian. It is the police system, not the personality of the candidates that is the more powerful determinant of behaviour and ideology.

It is common knowledge tha¹ police constables mainly come from the upper-lower class, lower-middeck class, and the working class. They are young but have limited education. They have no background of the psychology and sociology of human behaviour.

Their training may equip them with some legal knowledge but it does not make them socially mature persons. This is so because they come into contact with only a limited number of life-styles. Putting in long years of service, they gradually come to regard themselves as lower and middle class civil servants and bureaucrats.

They usually work with problems. Their social world is small. They perceive the larger community as consisting of people who do not understand them, do not wish to help or cooperate with them, and hardly even praise them for the good work they do.

Within the police, there is a feeling of social solidarity which helps them get the support of their colleagues and their superior officers in times of crises. The nature of their role does not give them the opportunity to strike friendships. As a result of this isolation, departmental social solidarity, and the role entrusted to them, the police develop a subculture of their own.

A policeman faces the problems of role conflicts because of his position in society. Rapidly increasing demands are being made on the police at a time when they have limited resources, money, personnel and training.

They are supposed to suppress protestors of all types (youth, peasants, workers, women, tribal’s, government employees, doctors, advocates and what not) but they are not supposed to use force against them, to hurt them or to injure them. They are unequipped to cope with the social ills that trigger these people to action. If they succeed in their roles, politicians get the credit, but if they fail, they are blamed by the politicians.

A policeman cannot always act according to the law. He is authorised to shoot a criminal who is trying to run away from the police station but most likely he will not shoot him because society does not expect him to shoot anybody. He can assault a person who is trying to set a public building on fire but he will not do that because society expects him only to arrest him and leave the punishment part to the courts.

During riots-whether it is communal riots or students’ riots-in which the possibility of killing, looting and destroying is quite great, he is expected not to use force because he is bound to be criticised later for excess use of force.

He faces the criticism of the media, the wrath of the citizens, unwarranted outbursts of politicians, and irritation of high police officials. He cannot punish a husband who beats his wife. He cannot show his emotions when he arrives at the scene of an accident and finds people crying. He faces lack of public acceptance.

Policemen also face conflict between the policing role and the rule of the law or protecting individual rights of citizens. The role of policing emphasises initiative rather than disciplined adherence to rules and regulations.

The rule of law emphasises the rights of individual citizens and imposes constraints upon the initiative of policemen. This conflict between the operational consequences of initiative and efficiency on the one hand and legality on the other, constitutes a serious problem for the police.

Policemen also face conflict between loyalty to colleagues and honesty. What should a policeman do when he comes to know that another policeman has taken a bribe, or has deliberately helped a criminal to escape, or has manipulated evidence and involved an innocent person, or has done something dishonest?

If he reports this dishonesty, he is criticised by his colleagues and if he ignores the dishonesty his own conscience as an honest officer pricks him. It is these dilemmas which affect his role performance.

Lastly, the policeman often faces role conflict in the courts. The credibility of police who testify in court appears to have been eroded. There was a time when a cop who testified with assurance helped the prosecutor in presenting his case. But now even the prosecutor wants him to manipulate his evidence.

The defendant shows respect to the judge and the lawyer but he looks at the policeman with scorn. The policemen today feel that like the public, the judge also supports the accused. The police now talk of ‘judicial leniency’ in the disposal of cases.

They hold that they take lots of pains in collecting evidence but the judges dismiss the evidence as unreliable. In India, in 1998, about 23.04 lakh cases under the IPC, inclusive of the pending cases, were taken up for investigation by the police.

Charge-sheets were submitted in 12.71 lakh cases. The courts took up only 8.95 lakh cases for trial. Of these only 37.4 per cent cases were convicted (1998: 14).

The policemen thus feel that they already had been lenient inasmuch as they had arrested only those persons who deserved punishment but, the courts, by not prosecuting all the arrested persons, in fact, put the police on trial.