Reforming the thana

Talking about the need for police reform, Union Home Minister L.K. Advani once spelt out a simple touchstone for the system8217;s success: the complainant should feel confident enough to directly walk into the nearby thana without wasting time and energy in approaching the local worthy, be it the corporator, MLA or MP. A strong and wholly deserved indictment of the existing system may be read into his words. The fact is that, over the years, public faith in the efficiency and professionalism of the police force has been progressively eroded. The fact also is that the time for superficial tinkering is long past and that what is needed is a comprehensive overhaul of the police system. Will the report of the five-member Police Reforms Committee constituted by the Home Ministry trigger that structural revamp? Or will its recommendations also lapse into obscurity and silence, like those of its predecessors? Past experience would appear to caution against being overly optimistic on this count. After all, the proposalsof the National Police Commission set up in the seventies to examine the structure and functioning of the police are still gathering dust. The report of the Julius Rebeiro-led committee, whose mandate it was to study the NPC8217;s recommendations, has met the same fate.

If taken seriously, though, the report of the K. Padmanabhaiah-led committee promises wide-ranging reform. The recommendations range from a coherent policy to counter terrorism and a drastic rationalisation of VIP security, to a revamped system of recruitment and training that will midwive the quot;thinking policemanquot;. On personal security, the report suggests that the state should provide security to a limited number of VIPs; the rest should pay for their personal security. It does not need statistics to prove that there is rampant misutilisation of police personnel in the name of security. Evidence abounds of the semantic boundaries of quot;threat perceptionquot; being stretched beyond all recognition to accommodate the demands of a specie that regards a security entourage as a status symbol, a necessary badge of influence, present as well as former. There is much to be said too for freeing the police force from the whims and fancies of its political masters. In public perception, the police have come to be seen asanother arm of the ruling dispensation. Promises of career advancement and threats of suspension and transfer are routinely used by political bosses to make officers toe the line. The committee8217;s recommendation of setting up an quot;independent inspectorate of policequot; an echo of the statutory quot;state security commissionquot; proposed by the NPC to carry out inspections of the force8217;s functioning, deserves to be taken up seriously.

Actually, neither the diagnosis that the Police Reforms Committee has made, nor its prescriptions are new. What is wrong with our police forces is so manifest that the government does not have to wait for another report of another committee to address itself to the problem. In the absence of political will, therefore, the Padmanabhaiah committee report will be just another means of delaying hard decisions.