Who cares about police reforms?

well, for one, certainly not the states of the country. All the states, except for Kerala, sat on the Supreme Court ordering police refors. All these states did was send an affidavit to the court asking the bench to dismiss the Public Interest Litigation brought about by former UP DGP, Prakash Singh.

Such is that mindset of the politicians. Why mess with such a perfectly exploitable system? A few days ago a media poll asked if the states were to blame for the lack of police reforms. While a majority said yes, I said no. The reason I said no is because I do not blame the states for not initiating police reforms. I blame the Federal government and the Supreme Court for not being tough enough on states to implement the reforms. I think it again demonstrates the classic Indian trait of not following up. The order is given, and is forgotten about. The states are expected to do their thing, and nobody bothers to double check. Taking a leaf from this system, the Indian infrastructure follows the same pattern too. Grand projects, once made, rot away.

But if I am not mistaken, I can see a rising awareness of this issue. The media has been picking up the related stories, and if the people can get involved this time, with a little support from the courts, then I am sure the netas will have to follow suit, because not matter how lethargic and incompetent they may be, you can make them run a 4 minute mile if you tell them there are votes to be had at the end.

Barring one, all states sat on police reforms for 10 yrs

NEW DELHI, OCTOBER 2: Ten days after the Supreme Court ordered all states and Union territories to put in place radical police reforms, there seems to be a studied silence among them — from Jaipur to Dispur, Chandigarh to Chennai. And the apparent lack of action on implementing the order, which has a December 31 deadline, is explained by how most of the states responded during the hearing of the reform petition: well, they did not bother to respond properly, if at all.

The decade-long process leading to the direction is a story of wilful apathy by most: After the court had served notice on the PIL, only Kerala sent its representative to New Delhi to put across its submission, said Prashant Bhushan, who appeared on behalf of petitioner Singh.

The rest, barring Orissa, shrugged off the notice by submitting brief affidavits that pleaded for the rejection of the PIL. Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, which send more than 100 MPs to the Lok Sabha but figure on top of the crime chart, did not even make an oral submission, let alone send in affidavits.

Other states and union territories that also chose to ignore the petition were Jammu & Kashmir, Tripura, Uttaranchal, Chhattisgarh, Delhi and Chandigarh.
Asked why UP did not care to send in an affidavit all these years, advocate-general SMA Kazmi said: “I don’t know about it. I have to check the records. I will talk to my DGP and let you know.’’

As for the papers that were filed, they were so sketchy that the court did not take note of them. About 19 states had sent their affidavits by 2000 and yet the court had to serve notices again to all of them. A bench, comprising Justice N Santosh Hegde, Justice BP Singh and Justice SB Sinha, on February 11 last year pushed the Centre and states to to “file their response within eight weeks’’.

Only eight states — Sikkim, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Punjab, Rajasthan, Mizoram — again filed their affidavits, if only to reiterate their opposition to proposed reforms.

The states are now required to fast-track the apex court’s order within three months but with such a tardy and evasive record, it remains to be seen where the process, set off by Singh’s PIL, now heads.

They said: We won’t, we can’t, we don’t have to

• MAHARASHTRA: Inconsistent with Constitution to make police machinery independent and directly accountable to the people
• GUJARAT: Not binding on government to accept the recommendations... of the National Police Commission as it has no statutory force
• MIZORAM: Petition deserves to be dismissed as in federal structure, no need of uniformity in administration
• MANIPUR: Separating investigation from police not possible, because it will require more police personnel, funds
• TAMIL NADU: Dismiss the petition, as it is wrong to say that Tamil Nadu had failed to implement any of the recommendations of the National Police Commission
• MEGHALAYA: For a state facing serious insurgency, not wise for us to separate investigation from police administration
• ASSAM: We are considering the state committee report
• KERALA: Absolute power for security forces could jeopardize popular government and democracy
• ANDHRA PRADESH: We reject petition, already implementing state-level reforms
• PUNJAB, HIMACHAL PRADESH: Petition does not merit attention as we have already made committees for appointing officers