Essay on police and society

The police have two main roles to play: crime investigation and crime prevention. The policemen's job is thus to enforce laws that protect people and property. It is said that the police reacts after crime is committed but plays no part in the causes of criminality.

No wonder, with this presupposition, traditional criminologists did not pay much attention to the analysis of the role of law enforcement agencies.

In recent years, however, the police organisation is paid more attention. This is because of the new role expected of the police, their increasing work-load, and the increasing corruption in the police system. Whether or not the police acknowledge police corruption, harassment, and violence, the public now wants some plain answers to some plain questions.

In a meeting on January 17, 1995 of senior police officers with school children in Ludhiana (Punjab) under the programme of "catch them young" to refurbish police image and create a close understanding with the public, the police officers were at a loss to answer quite a few embarrassing questions and explain their conduct in dealing with the day-to-day problems of the society.

Among the questions asked were: why are the police officials corrupt? Why do the police stations not record First Information Reports (FIRs) promptly? Why do the police close their eyes to the crimes of sons and daughters of VIPs? Why do they nab ordinary citizens for the smallest failings? Why do they break the bones of suspects during investigations?

Why do the cops not pay for the fruit and vegetables they buy, or for the rickshaw and the state transport buses they board? These questions not only made the officers realise that it was much easier to extort a confession than to answer straight questions, but also the fact that even small children had such a bad impression of the police and harboured many prejudices against them.

How do some criminals fall into the hands of the police while a large number remain undetected? The fact is that the police are reactive rather than proactive. Most offences are not reported to the police at all either because they involve no victim or because the victims are afraid of harassment by the police. Moreover, police contacts with citizens are mostly in response to calls initiated by them rather than the result of police action through detection of offences.

Further, the police arrest only those offenders who are poor and powerless. The rich and the influential manipulate to remain free. In addition, a large number of crimes fail to result in the apprehension of the law-violators largely because of the obstacles to police work caused by influential politicians ' and bureaucrats.

Many crimes known to the police are handled in informal and discretionary ways by the policemen. No wonder, the police often become a target of public hostility and the police too promptly return these feelings.

Lastly, the police respond to the public outcry to reduce crime by not registering a large number of reported cases, or by registering crime under less heinous sections. In states like Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, non-registration and minimisation of crime is practised on such a large scale that the statistics have little relevance to the actual state of crime.

Even a senior police officer like Ved Marwah has said: "Managing of statistics has taken the place of implementation of anti-crime measures.' (The Hindustan Times, October 25, 1993). Such a response is, in fact, counter-productive because not enough gets known to the police about the actual state of crime to enable it to take counter measures for checking crime.

For these reasons, it is now considered essential by social scientists to understand the variables that influence the differential handling of cases by the police. The social scientists even today get cold reception in the police department for they are suspected of having a major interest in exposing the police to further public condemnation.

Nevertheless, some scholars (like P.D. Sharma) have attempted to study police functioning and written books and articles on the police system. Some police officers too (like N.S. Saxena, Ved Marwah, K.S. Ghosh, K. Mathur, Rustom, Shankar Sarolia, etc.) have tried to study the internal working of the police system.

Our analysis of the police in this chapter is not concerned with police administration or with police structures or police organisation; rather it deals with the police as they actually operate.