CHALLENGES OF THE INDIAN POLICE

The hazard of the Indian police lies in immobility of its organizational

structure. The existing police system is utterly devoid of any adjustment
mechanism that keeps it relevant to the zeitgeist. A time-to-time review and
concomitant updating of the police organisation becomes sine qua non in the
circumstances. A systematic study of the policing in India with an adequate
pernoctation to screen the latest researches and findings in relevant fields of social
and political systems and science and technology in reorienting the public
organisation and administration is an essential parameter in the vital exercise.
A police setup worth its salt should meet the specific needs of the policing.
The police setup must necessarily be sturdy in its frame to be capable of
absorbing the shocks to which it would often be exposed. Secondly, motive
factors should be substructed in the body of the organisation as sound
motivation alone can make policing a purposeful activity. This should be
reinforced with external motive factors that can be infused to the organisation
e ra nata. Thirdly, the system should be organized so as to generate optimism and
confidence to generate magical entrainment. Another important aspect that should
weigh in evolving an effective police organisation is evolving a mechanism
whereby every police officer or unit is put in charge of a specific job matching
his or its competence and aptitude. An element of entrain should be brought to
policing so that the work in hand can be attended to with genuine involvement
by each police officer. Another strategic principle of healthy police organisation
is having absolute faith and giving full responsibilities to subordinates with a
concomitant, reward and punishment system that follows at the heels. Any
attempt to disturb the balance of faith, full responsibility and reward and
punishment system is certain to fell the organisation into desuetude. The extant
concept of collective responsibility through a chain of command has gone passe
by its propensity to demotivate the real workers due to the corrupt ambitions
of those at higher levels in the chain of command. Policing has grown of late to
be such independent fields of specialisiation that it is impossible for a mortal
being to be proficient in even a single aspect of policing. It is rather a folly to fancy
a police officer as being able to handle all aspects of policing. Hence, the need

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of specialization-oriented policing. The present managerial world is increasingly

realizing the importance of human resources as organizational inputs. Unless all-
out efforts are made to inhaust to police the crème de la crème of the country with
exceptional attributes of probity, intelligence and commitment and impart
eximious and purposeful training to bring out the best of each, no efforts at
updating the organisation can bring about a sempiternal transformation in the
setup. The fact that policing can be successful only with popular co-operation
focuses the attention of the police organisation on the needs of building up its
image. Although efforts are already afoot towards building up the image of the
police, the depths of the possibilities are yet to be fully explored and exploited.
A scientific approach in this score will make policing tanto uberior. Also, the scope
for scholarly and intellectual activities in policing will make policing multi-
dimensional and add to its effectiveness. The future police organisation and
administration should cater to the need of intellectual activities.
The present police organisation and administrative system have to be
overhauled in the near future as the ineffectiveness of the extant system becomes
increasingly obvious with the flaws in the edifice starting to gape wider. The areas
wherein restructuring is desirable and the thrusts sine qua non to fill the gaps to
create a healthy police setup that is quite capable of facing the challenges of the
future are discussed below.
The proclivity of weighing the police with reinforcement of all types of
legislations has become a major hazard to effective policing. While the
proliferation of legislations in independent India made it impossible even to keep
track of their numbers, it is senseless to force the police as being able to enforce
them all. The stupendous task of enforcing these legislations adversely affects the
effectiveness of the police and corrodes its credibility. This is emphatically so with
social legislations which pass out of our legislative houses sans cohibition. These
progressive measures are inherently controversial in nature and their
enforcement by the police weakens its credibility as an agency of serious business
and peremptory order. It is plauditory to conceive of the police as a vehicle of
progressive measures, but in the process, is certain to put both its credibility and
professionalism into jeopardy as the social legislations lack depth and gravity to
enforce them and assiduous enforcement may ricochet as an out-cry of
harassment and high-handedness. It is not in the interest of the country to expose
its police to such civil contecks and suffer it thereby.
India can have an independent social policing system under the social welfare
ministry to which police officers with a flair for progressive measures may be
deputed. The social policing system as a professional enforcement agency of the

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social policing system as a professional enforcement agency of the social welfare

ministry can do an effective job in enforcing progressive social legislations with
all their nuances, by fully devolving on it while saving the police organisation from
the embarrassment of handling issues to which it is not equipped either mentally,
professionally or organizationally. This measure will exeme the police
organisation from unwarranted pressures and enhances its legitimacy in handling
serious security and law and order issues.
The growth of police functions as adnated to present life-style of increasing
complexity is enormous of late with policing slinking to the vitals of all streaks
of social and nonsocial living. Policing is slinking to the vitals of all streaks of social
and nonsocial living. Policing has become a hi-tech affair these days with scopes
for further advancements. Each major activity of policing like maintenance of
order, investigation of crimes, collection of intelligence and security operations
have assumed such an independent status of non a such expertise and
professionalism that these fields being inhered is neither desirable nor feasible.
Nor in the circumstances, does shifting a functionary from one field of expertise
to the other help his overall performance. Anfractuosity in any one of these fields
of specialization for life is becoming a requisite as time goes by.
The futuristic policing of India must have its subordinate police as
professionals in a given field of specialization, say maintenance of order crime
investigation, intelligence collection or security operation with synergy
manifesting only at higher levels. So India may have independent law and order
police, detective police, special police and security police each separately
recruited and trained for professionalism and expertise in their respective fields.
Officers from all these specialized fields should be eligible to rise to general
policing at higher levels on the basis of a pro rata quota system for promotions.
The increased preoccupation of the police with law and order and security
issues in view of the growing cataclysmic activities in the country has adversely
affected effective crime administration of late. Police stations have become
registering stations as far as crime administration is concerned. The time of the
local police is fordone with immediate issues of law and order and VIP security,
and in the process, crime investigation has become a casualty. The process may
further deteriorate as security and law and order problems increase in coming
years. Neither the crime staff at subordinate levels nor the supervisory staff at
district and higher levels, in the melee, has the will or the resources to divert to
crime investigation while the crime rate in the country is assuming dangerous
proportions.

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Crime investigation should not be allowed to suffer because of disorder and

insecurity in the country, as otherwise, a vicious circle may develop wherein
disorder and insecurity lead to fall in investigation and flabby investigation in turn,
to patulous disorder and insecurity. This triste development may be effectively
dealt with by an independent crime setup, parallel to the law and order outfit.
An independent crime outfit in district and state may exquisitely behove to
a futuristic police setup by giving crime investigation a boost and insuring it
against the peracute pangs of organizational maladies of the future.
The compulsions of urban policing are strikingly different from those of rural
policing. Response time is the hallmark of urban policing where a delay of a few
minutes can make a difference between death and life as criminals and terrorists
with the most sophisticated communication, and weapon system and hair-
raising organizational accuracy overawe the police, pitted against them in the
course of their criminal operations. The present police station-oriented policing
are incompetent to meet the challenges of the urban criminals either in resources
or in organizational ingine. Further complacency in this regard may stifle the very
policing system of India.
Unity, resourcefulness and speed form the spine of urban policing. The
control room-centered policing in urban centers where men and transportation
and latest communication facilities that work round the clock in shifts enables
galvanic operations to tackle law and order problems.
This outfit with unlimited resources at its disposal for launching any type of
operation within a few minutes of communication may suffice to meet the
challenges of maintaining law and order in urban areas in the new age.
In spite of adequate infrastructures available for training police officials of
various ranks these centers largely fail to meet the quality required to make a
recruit a thorough professional. An overhaul of the extant training facilities in
terms of its quality, content and character is inevitable to keep the Indian police
prepared for future challenges. The training facilities should be made centers of
scholarship and research on police subjects with professionals of national
reputation in each subject handling their respective subjects. The psychology
faculty of the centre should endeavor to build character and infuse right
orientation among the recruits. The faculty members of the training centers
should be exceptionally well paid so as to inveigle the best in the field to join.
Army officers must handle outdoor classes. This model helps in instilling the
highest standards and expectations in trainees till they become full-fledged
officers and orient them to become professional police officers, apart from
distancing them from the moderate influences that are herded to handle police

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training centers in the present setup. The trainees must be exposed to police
officers as guest speakers, by inviting very senior police officers of the highest
integrity and job standards to deliver talks on specific topics. Separate
professional training courses should be available in the training centers for law
and order police, crime police, intelligence police and security police with scope
for advanced learning with an eye to the latest developments in each respective
field. Latest training methods should be adopted with management, computers
and advanced psychology inter alia as the common subjects of study for all the
courses. The training centers should give the impression of being temples of
advanced studies apart from being so.
Policing requires commitment and dedication on the part of its operators.
The principles of faith and responsibility must run invisus through the vitals of the
policing, should it be purposeful and successful. The extant bureaucratic malady
that infested the Indian police setup cohibits healthy policing practices. The police
organisation should be reoriented to develop a professional approach to its
operations with full faith and responsibility as the hallmark of the delegation of
power. The present emphasis on procedures should be shifted to commitment
and result-orientation within the ambit of the rules.
An analytical study of policing, its trends and modern techniques help to bring
professionalism in policing. Due encouragement for the study of theoretical
aspects of policing and its application in the field through in-service training will
be a welcome step in this direction. If police managers succeed in inspiring in
police officers an interest, in theoretical aspects of the policing and its latest
techniques, it would be a kenspeckle leap in abraiding Indian police to the
challenges of the future.
Policing as a phenomenon of maintaining order and security in society cannot
afford to be oblivious of the flux in the modern lifestyles. As an integral part of
civil living, policing must prepare itself to amate the increasing complexities of
modern life by modifying its organizational and administrative setups to the
demands these vicissitudes create. The changes warranted in policing may either
be deciduous or peremptory depending on the nature of the transition in society.
It is left to police planners to analyze the nature of the flux in the society and locate
the areas where decession from the past practices has become sine qua non for
policing. This should be an ongoing process if policing is to retain its relevance
as the guardian of social discipline. The futuristic challenges of policing would
be pro rata to the twists of the future living. The prospects of Indian population
reaching the mark of a billion and the concomitant luctation of two billion needy
hands to grab a share in the country’s limited resources of food, shelter, water,

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clothing, electricity schooling, employment etc., naturally make life a cut-throat

concours and a ruthless adventure devoid of scruple, human values and concern
for fellow men. Though the Indian policing system managed somehow to deal
with the vicissitudes till now, the geometric acceleration of the flux of the coming
years may prove to be too much to the extant police setup. Therefore, it is high
time now that we prepare out police organisation and administration for the
future challenges.

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