Khaki-Khadi nexus

Uniform corruption

The allegation by Param Bir Singh, the recently deposed Police Commissioner of Mumbai, that Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh demanded bribes from a subordinate police officer would not come as a surprise to many police officers. While Station House Officers (SHO) collecting hafta from various sources, including street vendors, and sharing the booty with their colleagues and higher-ups is common knowledge, the politician being in the loop has now come out into the open.

There was a time when politicians had no say in police functioning. The department head managed it professionally, and he was answerable only to the government. The Home portfolio was not a department of choice for many politicians. I remember an aspiring minister telling me, “What do you get from Home department, except salutes?” But politicians have since become smarter. They have discovered that they could get money, too, not just salutes.

The politician realised which police stations, considered ‘lucrative’, are in great demand. Those are the stations in whose jurisdictions are located liquor shops, bars and restaurants, brothel houses and gambling dens. And there are stations in whose jurisdiction real estate development is taking place where police officers not only get money but also get a flat or two as gifts from the developers. There are also units like the Crime Branch, where officers make money by simply threatening a gangster or setting one gangster against the other and ‘giving protection’ to them.

As the number of contending police officers for such lucrative posts is many times higher than the availability of such posts, many officers are willing not only to pay an initial price to get such postings but also to make recurring monthly payments to those who get them such ‘coveted’ posts. They openly flout the rule that stipulates bringing political influence in respect of service matters as misconduct. There is a race among police officers to outbid each other to get such posts. And there is a race among politicians, too, to recommend ‘their’ candidates for those posts. This ‘system’ cuts across party lines, but usually it is the local legislator or the minister in charge of the district or the Home Minister who gets such work done.

But making money is not the sole reason for politicians to interfere in police postings. Politicians want the men they trust as SHOs in their constituencies to use them to suppress dissent, silence political opponents, and to aid them in illegal activities. Usually, a police officer belonging to their community or closely known to them or a native of their constituency is selected. But the important criterion is that the selected officer should be willing to do their bidding. It is like having a private army at government expense. Hence, apart from money, caste plays a major role in postings.

After getting a police officer of choice, if the officer doesn’t toe the line, the same politician gets the officer posted out. There was a time when within 12 months, a politician would get three or four officers posted to the same police station to increase his earnings. To overcome this problem, some states gave a minimum tenure to SHOs and officers manning ‘executive’ posts. But politicians have already found loopholes in this procedure.

When postings were decided by senior police officers, merit played a major role. But when senior officers themselves started vying for postings to districts and ranges and even to head the department by approaching politicians, they had no moral right to discipline their subordinates, and hence the system of politicians deciding police postings came to take root.

What started as interference in the posting of SHOs slowly extended to higher ranks which mattered, like Circle Inspectors, Deputy SPs and even District Superintendents of Police. Initially, there was resistance on the part of some officers in the police hierarchy to such interference, but slowly they had to give in. With coalition governments becoming the order of the day, Chief Ministers and Home Ministers, too, started to agree to the demands of legislators and allowed them to have a say in police postings.

Alarmed at the situation, Prakash Singh, a retired IPS officer, approached the Supreme Court and sought its intervention. A slew of reforms was mandated by the top court in 2006, the most important of which was related to postings, including the Head of State Police. While most states ignored these directions completely, some states implemented watered down versions. Dealing with Param Bir Singh’s petition on March 24, the Supreme Court remarked, “…there has been no seriousness by all concerned to ever implement the directions enshrined in the (Prakash Singh) judgement.” It is no secret that apart from politicians, some police officers themselves are responsible for this. And the political decisions in police postings continue as a quid pro quo. But the irony is that if the cop gets into trouble, as Mumbai Assistant Police Inspector Sachin Vaze has, no politician will save him.

Is there a way to break this nexus? Here are some things that need to be done. Those posts that are considered ‘executive’ should not have a tenure of more than 18 months. A person posted to such a post should not be posted to similar ‘executive’ posts for at least five years after completing his term. An officer should have served a minimum of five years of non-uniformed posting immediately preceding his posting to an executive post. There must be a roster system for postings. All postings should be decided by a committee consisting of five senior officers and its recommendation must be implemented. And those who are facing charges of corruption or criminal cases should not be considered for ‘executive’ postings. All cases of corruption should be enquired into speedily and sanctions for prosecutions should mandatorily be decided within a month of a request being made by the investigating authority. The conduct rules dealing with bringing political pressure for postings should be strictly enforced. If these suggestions are formulated as Rules, political interference in police work might reduce.

(The writer is a former Director-General of Police, Karnataka)