Like in the movies

Bollywood has spoken of it often: the police-politician nexus that undermines — eviscerates even — the Indian system. How many potboilers have you seen where an honest officer trying to change the system jolts the cosy world of his dishonest, compliant underlings and their political godfathers? How many plots play out with the enemies of the honest officer getting together to ease him out? Far too many. But the frightening thing: this doomsday scenario is now real life in a city once known for its order, enterprise and men and women of conviction. Still, movies need the feel-good factor, so eventually the villainous go down in a hail of bullets and righteous sermons.

Real life is not quite so sanguine. That is why Mumbai’s police commissioner, Parvinder Singh Pasricha, got his marching orders within 77 days of beginning an unprecedented clean up of a tarnished, debilitated police force. When he took over, the Mumbai police lived days of “encounters” — an euphemism for the assassination of underworld figures — easy money, and the cash-for-transfers industry so distressingly institutionalised during the home ministerial reign of Chhagan Bhujbal. Pasricha’s problem with his political bosses — who now hide behind the ridiculous fig leaf of his promotion — was that he did more than talk about cleaning up: he actually began to do it. A meticulous and learned officer with a doctorate in traffic management, Pasricha was aware of the disdain and disgust that Mumbai’s enlightened citizens felt for a police force with the dubious distinction of having the highest number of officers, including Pasricha’s predecessor, arrested on various charges of corruption during 2003. Shunning interviews, he systematically removed officers who had remained in their posts gathering sloth and easy money.

Unfortunately, many of these officers had paid for their posts. Plus, they were compliant cash cows routinely milked by politicians. And with elections bearing down on the Congress-Nationalist Congress Party government beleaguered by charges of corruption and inefficiency, obviously a cleanup, a turning-off of the spigot of sleaze, was a disastrous idea. There was no question Pasricha had boldly set out on the right road. That was his problem.