Copped out in khaki

The Indian police has inherited all the negative dimensions of the Raj. But the force can humanise, if given the chance

Anju Gupta Delhi

From New Delhi to New York to Berlin to Bangkok to Osaka to Singapore, the term ‘police’ evoke a strange, but familiar, reaction. International organisations, too, seem to carefully scrutinise human rights credentials of anyone coming with a law-enforcement background. Indeed, it does not take too much to diagnose that the common perception about police that runs across cultures is its ‘unique’ ability to ignore the humanness of a situation. There is something inherent in the role of police as an enforcer (and controller) that brings out the lack of human touch universally, and to varying degrees. Of course, in this comparison, professional standards are not being compared.

In India, the picture of the men in khaki evokes variety of feelings among people, induced mostly by common sights ‘on the streets’, such as a cop chasing a rickshawpuller, a traffic constable badmouthing a commoner for an innocent violation of a traffic law, merciless beating of an encroacher-hawker or protestor, with the usual sprinkling of the card-playing, paan-chewing and paunch-sporting cop in the neighbourhood looking for his weekly hafta from a poor vendor trying to earn his honest living.

It is these recurring, undeniably negative, visual experiences that create deep impressions on the minds of people and stay with them forever. Although a large number of people do not come in direct or indirect contact with police, yet, these negative images create a formidable barrier between a citizen and the subordinate levels of police (who present the face of the police organisation).

Since, for most people, police is the first point of contact with the criminal justice system, a citizen feels unsafe at the mercy of a ‘brutalised’ police force. What if I have to deal with the police?

It is intriguing how a friendly young man from the neighbourhood becomes so unfriendly after joining police. Why does he/she exhibit less humanity when faced with real or so-called provocations? But before we probe into what brings about this change, let us take a hard look at the character of the society this person comes from. How does society (a collection of people in a situation) react in the face of real or so-called provocations?

In case of a road accident, for example, we usually protest by smashing vehicles or by bashing up the driver and thereby creating a lot of tension in public space. To protest against the low supply of electricity, we block roads, burn down electricity offices and beat up the staff. We sometimes go berserk over the natural death of a movie icon. If we catch a thief, we definitely beat him up mercilessly before handing him over to police. We quietly rejoice extra-judicial killings of criminals. We generally demand/buy/plead summary trial by police for most of our problems and would even proactively support ‘third degree’ to recover a lost item.

These undeniably negative and violent images are as real. It is rather easy to understand that anyone coming from a society with this kind of social conditioning will have to be reformed in a lawful and humane manner in the face of real or so-called provocations. Having said that, police was created and used by the British to keep the ‘colonised subjects’ in check, by implementing the undemocratic rule of force in the garb of rule of law. The legacy has, more or less, continued in this approach to policing. Hence, anyone joining the organisation with unreformed social conditioning internalises these ‘values’ over a period of time. The process gets reinforced and accelerated by environmental factors, such as working and

service conditions.