Dinesh Kamath's Editorial 'Police reforms needed' that was published in Newsband

Police reforms needed

In a landmark 2006 verdict, the Supreme Court came out with its now famous seven steps to police reforms. Insulation of the force from illegitimate political interference, transparency in the appointment of the DGP, separation of the law and order and investigative functions and the establishment of a complaints authority are the more important among them. They still remain on paper.

Why do we need reforms in Police? Most of the problem is due to ineffectiveness of the police forces and hence it is necessary to pressurize the government to bring these essential reforms.

As long as criminals are elected to state legislatures and Parliament, we cannot expect the political class to exhibit the necessary political will to introduce these reforms. All political parties depend upon local criminals for ensuring availability of manpower and many big leaders actively participate in subverting the law. The fundamental problem is the way political class views the police system. The problem is not that Police has forgotten their primary duties of protecting citizens. When politicians interfere in almost all important aspects related to the working of police force, how can you expect the police to ignore the politicians?

Political interference has frequently prevented police from performing their constitutional duties. If the situation remains the same then ‘police vs citizen’ picture will become day to day picture. Hence states have to bring police reforms. If the government do not make the law and order clean and transparent, then keepers are going to be killers.

It is the duty of state government to provide transparent, efficient, effective policing in the state. Rather than providing this, the state government uses police for their personal endorsement and gains.

It is a fact of life that people fear the police more than they fear the thieves. While the thieves run away when they see people, the honest people run away, when they see the police.

Apart from police administration reforms citizens want electoral law and legal reforms, too. Since all parties think that reforms will reduce their power to make money in collusion with the bureaucracy, every national party likes to delay implementation of reforms by as many years as possible. It is high time the citizens insisted upon urgent Police Reforms.