Desirable direction

for policing

in the fast changing societies

by Dr. S. Krishnamurthy, Indian Police Service,

Former Director General of Police, Karnataka State, India

Admittedly the venture suggested by the theme above is of immense significance to almost all the police systems of the world. In that really Byzantine scenario, an old Chinese adage, which says that, “ the art of good administration lies in acting in a crisis with a sense of calm and in acting during the calm by thinking ahead of a crisis1” seems most appropriate. Prophetic and wise indeed! Undeniably, we are passing through an epoch where never ending crisis situations seem to relentlessly envelop the human world one way or the other. Even a cursory look at the current events would surely be a harbinger to the emerging scenario, as all indications are loud and clear enough to portray that the possible future. It is in that exigent backdrop, we need to strive hard in planning and working towards safer, peaceful and happier environs for human civilizations.

World is altering rapidly and so are most societies across the globe. And yet, traditional ideas and values still continue to have a say in the social, cultural and religious milieu of very many nations and such facets surely impact the myriad characteristics and styles of internal management of such societies. A contention of that kind is clearly visible in a substantial number of nations, especially those situated in the eastern part of the world. But, due to the rapidly shrinking world, as if in a literal sense, helped by the persistent and cascading explosion of the information era, the distance between people and nations are getting crunched in a very visible and vigorous manner. Further to that, infinitely rapid transitions in the means of transport and travel across the globe are clearly providing a platform to render true the ideas of a global village. In addition to these two specific areas of human life, all kinds and countless varieties of technological advances are creating newer and wider complexities to the existence and advancement of humans and as a corollary, of nations. Though these alterations are providing a juncture for fantastic choices and options for human progress, it is equally true that these variations are adding to the endless list of problems and posers to the very existence of civilizations in an umpteen number of ways.

In that really edifying scenario, it is only natural to note that the integrated and aggregated consequences of all such variables act as pressure points of modern times, influencing a never-ending range of internal and external compulsions on all most all nations or societies. But, many of the basic and elementary hiatus subsisting in the internal contradictions of almost all societies, due to various reasons like poverty, hunger, disease, crime, disorder and so on, continue to add up, creating a galling effect on all efforts to sustain peaceful civic living.

Crisis confronting the respective political hierarchy and social leadership in their efforts to administer their respective territories is really looming. The concept of maintaining order and sustaining peace, in that backdrop is surely a ‘not-so-easy’ an enterprise. The task is just not the mere internal management of a nation, as substantial ingredients of any nations life will get affected by happenings around the neighboring nations as well as by events across the globe. Even a quick assessment of the prevailing setting in the world would reflect the exasperating fact that virtually all areas of human life are facing an immense challenge to the very genius and innovative abilities of the mankind. To put it very mildly, all aspects of societal life of nations of the world are inevitably consigned in that vortex of chaotic uncertainty.

Another startling change that is slowly engulfing the nations is the emergence some kind of uniformity of ideas and thinking on most aspects of societal management, including policing the societies. There are several reasons for this clearly visible phenomenon. Firstly, the means of communication and transport within nations as well as outside is fast engulfing the world and that easy access to information and movement has been obliging immense inducements in the interaction amongst people. As people’s physical movements well intellectual exchanges from and to all parts of the universe is simplified and rendered easy, responsibilities stemming out of those interactions are cutting across territorial boundaries. Such new thoughts are clearly overcoming several other constraints that would be cropping up owing to reasons like language, cultural and religious values and so on.

History of this planet is thus a witness to the steady and systematic transitions in the life and styles of human agglomerations from simple agrarian and rural based loosely knit arrangements to highly industrialized metropolis or modern day mega urban centers. Notwithstanding these phenomenal changes, the rural scenes are also subsisting, perhaps with some perceptible alterations, in these fast-changing settings. Besides the gulf between the rich and the poor, the urban –rural rift is also aggregating to the predicament ahead.

Amongst the most affected social arrangements of internal management of any country by these up-and-coming developments, more so of a democratic kind, are the role and functions of the Police or the Law Enforcement organizations. This is necessarily so as the very nature of work of these institutions (i.e., the Police) are, from a historical and conventional perspective, generally dependent on a style which has been hitherto reflecting an “action-reaction” genre of work. As these police organizations are bound to bear the brunt of these up and coming relentless pressures and pulls, it is only meet and proper that the police professionals, Public Administration experts as well as the leading lights amongst the social and political leaders endeavor to seek the best way to ride safely out of the approaching turmoil. In the context of modern management techniques, it is easy to understand that the police systems are torn between all such shifting panorama and rapidly mutating conditions of life. Perforce all concerned will have to think, plan and marshal the best options for police systems to come up with the best answers. After all, it is well said that being forewarned is forearmed in the collective battle against lawlessness and disorder.

Problems galore and the likely crisis areas

Besides the specified agencies of the United Nations, which periodically publishes the “Crime data” and their permutations concerning most of the nations of the world, respective countries also project surveys of violations of substantive penal laws and the crime statistics affecting their nations. Such actions are also done with the intention of improving the crime fighting strategy. In addition, it is also a tool or yardstick to assess the working of respective internal law enforcement systems.

Based on such data, following observations are clearly relevant to the current discussions: -

1. Crime trend, generally across the globe, though showing an upward drift, has not been, fortunately for all of us, rising at par with the rate of increase in population.

2. However, violent crimes are on the rise and that viewpoint is further accentuated by the fact that violence spurred by acts of terrorism and extremism and similar hazards are on an escalating propensity.

3. Violence against women and children as well as other weaker sections are also showing an ascending movement

4. Trafficking of all types including humans is now a real international crisis zone. Drugs, money laundering, smuggling of prohibited items as well as trafficking of men, women and children are steeply increasing. Human misery prompted by such misadventures is slowly corroding the human values, besides creating rifts, strife and mistrust amongst people and societies. Organized crimes of all kinds are a reality and such misadventures encompass nations easily circumventing all physical boundaries between nations. The spread of such menace is slowly engulfing the world in latent as well patent ways.

5. Computer prompted violations like Intellectual property contraventions as well as internet and cyber crimes are clearly the rapidly increasing violations of law and these depredations have no barriers of land or zone or not stopped by other hurdles like language, race, sex and similar other facets of life.

6. Due to alarming rise in urban populations, cities are getting congested beyond reason and such inclinations are adding to the litany of regulatory problems inclusive of managing traffic and safe or easy movement of people, which facilitates several other normal human activities. Besides those bottlenecks, such intensely flanking human placement is adding to other civic constraints like emergence of slums, poor living conditions, health hazards and so on – all of which directly or indirectly affect various Law Enforcement tasks.

Admittedly, the basic features of the human society have not undergone a vast modification over several centuries. Yet, visible changes are well seen in the type and styles of living, especially in a technology driven modern world, more so in a democratic system. In that context, the role and goal functions of the law enforcement systems have been under continuous amendments. Though, an age-old adage says that “Policemen are People wearing Uniform and People are Policemen in civilian attire”, civic awareness of that kind is not reflected at that ideal level any where in the world. However, there is no shortage in the extent and scope of normal public expectations from their lawmen.

It stands to reason that in our effort to think and evolve ideas, which can help the police systems to come to grips with the future, we need to surely reckon the basic parameters of commonly held public notions on the efficacy of the police.

First and foremost, normal public expectations hinge on that crucial facet of “police effectiveness” in dealing with the crisis of Crime. Prevention and Detection of Crime are surely the first charters on them. More than that, as experts of Sociology would say, it is the freedom from the ‘fear of crime’, which is a latent but clearly perceived need. Further, the community would look for a sense of confidence in the sustained ambience of peace and order. In that folder, they would want to see that the concept of “Rule of Law” really works and that the police would deal with all violations of law in an evenhanded manner. Said differently, ensuring that the guilty don’t escape,

is a general public urge. Further, it is easy to see that the community wants the police to be clearly effective in all that they do and in all their role and goal exertions. In addition to all the above, a normal optimism of the people would want to believe that their police will develop and sustain their ability to respond to all kinds of “emergencies and crisis situations”, that may suddenly confront the people – due to natural or man mad causes.

Any impartial observer of the systems of Public Administration would surely acknowledge that the people would judge the police more harshly in comparison to any other wing of government. Though on the first blush it may appear to be unfair, one can draw a sense satisfaction that there is a hidden confidence in the people’s mind that the police can rise up to such rigorous standards. In fact, people believe that such success efforts can be attempted only under an intense and unending “real-life” examinations of all their (police) abilities. Though it is a universal fact that there have been steady and systematic additions to the range and spread of various social service activities of the police, (which really consume relatively more time and resources of the system for all such deeds), commensurate value additions to the force in terms of competence and resources have not been uniform.

Thus, it would indeed be a very tall order to measure up to all the expectations briefly narrated above. However, if the portents of ensuing times have to keep in mind, then, the charge on the police will all the more be exasperating. Admittedly, we cannot ignore that intimidating and ominous reality as it were. Therefore, all enterprise like the current intellectual efforts is surely in response to that gigantic but inevitable task. In that panorama, all our united thinking and planning should spur all the concerned to seek, innovate and implement all that their best ideas can suggest.

Though the some police leaders have here and there thrown up their hand and have exclaimed “thus far and no further,” for the steadily increasing role and responsibilities for the police, there are sufficient grounds to hold that the political hierarchies would not put a break on that type of growth. Surely thus, the police will have to come up with answers to meet all such steadily increasing burdens some way or the other. The sovereign functions of any state is an expanding horizon and in a fast changing world, it has become inevitable to develop an omnipotent and every ready structure of governance where law enforcement network which is available round the clock, seven days a weak and three sixty five days a year and that too, with out a break, as it were.

Some of the visible global trends in numerous policing styles: -

A cyclic trend seems to be visible particularly in policing styles across the globe, similar to the transformations that are seen in many other areas of modern life. Historical chronicles bear a kaleidoscopic testimony to a more or less uniform fact that policing systems in most parts of the world have indeed emerged out of martial brand of societal control systems. These measures have subsisted over a period of time, before modern policing organizational structures started emerging slowly in the not so distant a past. Admittedly, such formations have been progressively altering their respective shape, size and colour as well as their operational ethos. A gradual but a systematic evolution of a locally answerable police system (in terms of democratic decentralization) from a highly centralized and core controlled rigid military type of structures is very evident on worldwide basis. Though the urge is towards decentralization of the entire system of police networks, the transition has not reached its fulfillment and a hierarchical control effected from various levels and still under the hawk eye of the nucleus is the most commonly prevailing style. However, these law enforcement systems have not fully realized the impact of the organizational structure and its working styles on the success of the respective systems. Further, a large number of them are yet to grasp the consequences as well as the complexities of innumerable debilitating problems of crime, caused by both the traditional as well as modern kind (more particularly those which are violent and which cause destruction life, limbs and property – like the terrorism extremism and the likes) or the new brand of technology spurred offenses like cyber and computer crimes, international financial crimes or the incessant threats to peace and order domains within the communities. All these threats to order seem to be coming as unending waves of disruption of normal and peaceful life styles. In addition, a plethora of other constraints hamper many of the regulatory enterprise of the law enforcement machineries. Needless to note that all such adversities have been putting breaks on any simple or straightforward police efforts, which may have been marginally successful in the yore.

During the later half of the twentieth century, several experiments to weld the police networks very closely with the respective communities were ventured in many places of the democratic world, more particularly in the United States, United Kingdom and in some nations of Europe. Some of them were also inspired by such well-established practices in countries like Japan. A good number of such experiments are still going on, almost everywhere, with the needed nuances added in their relevant approaches. Many clear indications of all such efforts are making it obvious that police in any democratic life, cannot hope or aspire to thrive without the people’s latent and/or patent support.

In that backdrop it is very certain that all the police systems in semi-urban and rural settings would do well to realize that a really genuine Police Community partnership the best insurance for the organizational success. That can be so ensured when the police really become a part and parcel of people’s participation in a mode of local self-governance. But, at the same time, we need to note a harsh reality that such an arrangement may not be enough to fully face the of complexities of emerging threats to peace and order on a global or macro levels.

Another facet of evolving secure condominiums is a strategy of New Urbanism. In that canvass, styles of physical structures are being planned and provided to reduce the opportunity for crime. A new nomenclature under the theme “Designing out Crime” seems attractive enough as that hinges on a plan of action, that creates neighborhood in which crime can be contained or prevented by structural and physical designs. Such experiments are being ventured in many places across the United States and in England. Examples of efforts made in New Haven are a pointer to the trend. Admittedly such steps are likely to yield welcome results and yet they are limited in terms of building up of such new urban centers. But that clearly fails to answer the crisis confronting well-established cities and big urban locales.

While taking of Police and the Community, we need to note that the traditional values, customs as well as community practices, have an inherent strength as a means of societal control. Such routines are still in vogue in many of the societies of the East. Unlike in the west, where such internal pressure mechanisms are not so powerful or effective, it is worthy of observance that ancient civilizations have handed down many such practices and mores, which would help and advance the cause of peace and order as well as in conflict resolution techniques, which are workable in an innumerable number of ways. It is perhaps in the best interest of all such nations in the Asian Region to fully avail all such potentials in sustaining peace within the communities and for advancing the cause of justice and law. In fact, there is good case to promote all efforts to innovate and pursue a continuing venture to invoke all such tactics that can weld the traditional values with the modern needs of peace and order.

Similarly, besides the direct measures to increase the “police Community’ partnerships coming under various styles (like Problem Oriented Policing, Neighborhood Watch, friends of Police and so on) there are also some experiments which work on a “Zero tolerance” modus operandi to disorder. Such methods hold a view and belief that a small problem nipped in the bud even in its nascent stage will surely be a preventive tonic against a possible problem, which may become big.

Keeping in mind that wide range and immense width of problems that are encountered by the police of the present as well as the possible scenario in the ensuing times, it may not be wise for the police to emphatically assume either a purely military model (as seen in increasing military outfits in the police networks) or go totally on a individualistic village or small town network of law enforcement pattern. Thus, a debate is worthy of our attention to come up with an ideal plan of organizational architecture.

Increasing threats to peace and the perils of the ilk like the terrorist misadventures have created in most parts of the world, a ‘clearly natural type of martial response and that has created a structural straight jacket, at times, affecting the ethos “law enforcement” in a civic society. As a result, more and more militarization of some crucial aspects of Police work seems to be the emerging trend. SWAT units, which are armed to the teeth and are ultra machine oriented, seem dot the systems everywhere. In many such situations, policing is increasingly becoming impersonal and that is understandably so. But, we cannot ignore an explicit fact that such style does drive a steadily increasing distance between the people and the police. Many experts see such developments as compelling the police to go “apart” from the community rather than becoming a “part” of it. Though it is necessary to reckon the gravity of all volatile situations, which can harm innocent lives and force us to reconcile with the reality that such outfits are inevitable preferences in these hazardous and infinitely deadly times. In that specific background, the traditional view of a policeman being a “friend, philosopher and a guide” to the members of the community is seemingly becoming irrelevant. Mechanized and highly automated developments of that category are clearly visible at least in most of the mega-cities and urban centers. Many sociologists and management experts predicts that such drifts may stretch well into the rural locales if the problems like extremism and Terrorism and so on go unabated, vitiating the entire spread of all such regions.

It needs to be kept in mind here that “policing styles” which advance the directly involved one to one or cop-community contact methods are still sure to be effective and decidedly they will continue to be so. Though, a fully trained commando type of outfits are no doubt needed for certain specified types of dangerous situations mentioned earlier, it is also certain that the military model if carried to far, would make the police systems to look like an occupational army with no people’s support or suffer a gradually decreasing buttress. Under those contingencies, time would not far off when the police would have to face intense hostility of the populace, even for simple or essential regulatory measures - making all their genuine exertions really fruitless in the ultimate analysis.

In that really complex context, it is necessary for the police organizations to develop an ethos, which permeates a dynamic and innovative management styles. The modalities of such a vibrant institution will appear similar to a well-integrated hospital or a medical center, which will be capable of dealing with routines or emergencies either at a macro level or at a micro level, easily in its stride. In that approach, the system needs to be geared to meet all challenges in a routine as well as a professional manner, without being impersonal or mechanical. Such responses to events ranging similar to a sudden emergency of a minor health crisis to a major and complicated medical calamity and manage to overcome the predicament successfully. Such a structure must reflect a kind of a front office which is able to assess the impending problem on a case to case basis and deal with it and that arrangement cannot forsake its ability to spread its wing and potential to deal with a situation like the spreading of a contagious and infectious disease and deal with it. Such a scenario is reminiscent of an old village doctor who knew each and everyone and their health problems and would deal with each crisis with consummate ease and aplomb. However, he would be ready and willing to take the needy to a specialist or an expert as and when the necessity arose.

The Rural Policing styles

Another important area of concern is the prevailing and clearly increasing Urban –Rural divide that impale most of the nations. It needs no special mention that one of the most glaring realities adversely affecting the current day police systems is the lack of good policing cover for the rural parts of most societies. In countries like India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and so on, the concept of rural policing is just a ‘name-sake’ arrangement and it is built more on hope that the rural populace will volunteer to do a substantial part of assisting the police in maintenance of order or in detection of crimes. Admittedly, as a rule, order challenges are not frequent in pastoral or village settings and yet the crisis of crime is surely a problem that people in those areas face. It is here that the police systems have got to innovate and motivate the people to respond to the societal needs in terms all security dimensions. Creativity, innovation and motivation to inspire them are all essential in this direction. Keeping in mind the cost of resources to provide such a structure, it would fall upon the leadership to think of ways and means to elicit people’s direct as well as indirect support in contributing towards safe environs around them. This is really a loose area of police work and a practical suggestion would be to plan and pursue steps that can help in eliciting and evoking voluntary civic sense amongst them. Besides building networks that can be made viable by some sort of a semi-formal security structures, which in the long run would help the police and the society to come up trumps in all their peace keeping missions.

Besides thinking about the basic architecture of an ideal police network of the ensuing era, some of the specific aspects that need special and undivided attention are enumerated as below: -

1. Problems like Terrorism, extremism, international crimes involving contraband, drugs, arms and extending to human trafficking, trans-national crimes of various kinds, crimes of the computer era, cyber crimes, internet crimes and so on have suddenly transformed the world of the not-so-distant past to look like a kindergarten in relation to the burgeoning numbers as well as staggering types of fresh catalogue of crimes, that have started bugging the world. There are clear and unambiguous indications that such depredations will surely escalate into monstrous proportions in the following age.

However, we cannot forget a dichotomous fact wherein the traditional crimes of the folklore type have not yet left many nations, especially in Asia. Armed dacoits or gangsters on horseback or other rudimentary means of transport and similar other conventional crimes of an endemic nature, still bug the urban as well as rural countryside of many of these countries in the eastern hemisphere. Though organized crimes of varied hues and colour have now got entrenched in these societies, the individualized and ancient types of crimes all so continue to confound the police. Skill and acumen of all such police forces would thus be fully tested in their ability to tackle the erstwhile and antique types of crimes as well as the ultra-modern lawless ventures of all types.

A remarkable facet of modern world of the current times is the dramatic change in the economic policies of the vast number of countries, explicitly seen in the last one or two decades. That glaring transition has given a catalytic spur around the world and has dramatically altered the crime and order scenario in a very big way.

Most police forces of to-day are no doubt in a state of flux in terms of grasping their own identity and comprehending the relative significance of their potential in the context of an emerging enigmatic era. Police are facing a challenge in terms of understanding and developing skills and abilities to tackle the emerging types of crimes and violations, which result due to the abuse and misuse of the free market concepts and of open global exchanges of all types.

An incongruous situation is patently making it awkward for the Law Enforcement systems, as most varieties of crimes have been steadily tracing an upward trend vis-à-vis the falling standards in terms of detection and conviction. Prevention of crime seems to have become cursory obsequies of the police stations with limited or inadequate or grossly insufficient resolution or dedication to contain and fight the menace. The net result has been that these failures have been rather unnoticeably relegating the basic utility value of the police to the stability and peace within the community. True that the police have to depend on the people for all aspects of crime prevention and for several “order related activities”. Yet, due to the poor image that the police have acquired over a long time the foundations for building a strong community-police partnership is reduced to a mere theoretical exercise, ventured half-heartedly here and there. The public perception about the police holds an unenviable view that the latter are neck deep in security concerns dominantly focused on all physical and related aspects of protection of VIP’s and generally worrying and working about the law and order in the urban centers, especially the political capitals or regional centers of various nations. Naturally, all other aspects of crime (prevention and detection included) and every other service are dependent of the time that is left after their major worries narrated above.

By and large, the police work seems to reflect more of a ‘reactive’ genus and the innovative and people oriented ‘pro-active’ styles are yet to become the established practices. Notwithstanding all the constraints and impediments, some of the following steps are worthy of consideration, especially in the context of the complex future that beholds them.

I. Infuse “True Professionalism”: - a) The police must become really professional in their work. Building truthful work styles and developing right occupational ethos is a first step. Accomplishing the professional goals in a correct, legitimate and lawful manner and to mirror in real effect the ideals of “Rule of law” should form the genuine foundation in that quest. The organization has to sustain comprehensive efforts to build professional knowledge and skill base on the entire range of police activities. Unless relevant advances in applied sciences and other fields are steadily and systematically internalized into the system, there will be no qualitative as well as quantitative improvements in the functioning of the police.

b) Police manpower has been steadily mushrooming over the years and unfortunately that facet is clearly getting enmeshed in a stalemate, which reeks of the “law of diminishing returns”. As a result the community is slowly getting disillusioned to find that its scarce resources not being productively employed. The leadership and the governments will have to drastically alter their strategies in ensuring a viable the cost-benefit ratio on the investment made by making certain that worthwhile productivity surfaces from the entire system. Admittedly, many of the Sovereign functions fulfilled by the police cannot be really measured in terms of productivity or returns. Yet, it is possible to validate that the cumulative work of the police weighs favorably in relation to the huge resource investment that the society is making.

c). The police will have to treat their work as a true profession on a graded basis. At the basic level, an average policemen, i.e., the lawmen who becomes the first contact point between the people and the organization will have to develop and demonstrate a good and positive response styles coupled with helpful attitude, so that he is able to size up quickly the needs of each case or situation. Based on that assessment he should be able then to refer the matter to experts for appropriate as well as complete handling at a slightly higher level. Registration of offences, investigation of cases, conflict resolution, petition enquiry, myriad routine administrative checks (for example various verifications and scrutiny types of tasks for issuance of documents like passports, employment and so on) as well as an assortment of secondary level regulatory functions and a litany of other activities are the unceasing examples to give glimpse of the range of police work. The initial contact point between ‘people’ and ‘police’ can be compared to the first response in a hospital where the preliminary examination helps in quickly assessing the type of medical attention that would apply to that specific case - ranging from an outpatient attention or an extended medication or even an emergency operation to save the person! In other words, the police system must really have both the generalists and specialists well bonded in a hierarchical as well as a horizontal system, which promptly and quickly attends to all public calls.

d. In pursuance of that effort the police must nourish and draw on high quality expert studies on all aspects of police work so that the seemingly innumerable police activities are simplified and standardized. All routine police activities must be rendered quick and receptive and all such efforts will have to be developed and continued relentlessly.

II. Emphasize and ensure full play of Human Rights

There can be no doubt that dignified policing is indeed an inevitable facet that nurtures the correct and ideal work ethos for a democratic living. The need to improve the quality and effectiveness of police work can be to a great extent accomplished by good and systematic supervision by the leaders by a methodical overseeing of the law enforcement work of all hues done by the police station levels and upwards. As a wide array of police tasks and actions affect the freedom and liberty of people, scrutiny and control of the exercise of all police powers are a must. Though the courts are by law expected to fulfill that part of the exertion, the role of the leaders to continuously provide the balancing and correcting measures cannot be understated.

a. Human rights in police work are perhaps the most vital charter on the police system as a whole. Those noble ideals really convey that “means” of all police work are as important as the “end’ that is sought to be achieved by the police – individually as well as a team. It exemplifies in other words that the police must realize that they are meant to serve the people clearly in accordance with the law of the land. Conversely it crystallizes the golden path that they (the police) are not reflecting the interests of the political power alone or the people who are politically or otherwise strong. Said differently, the proposition merely epitomizes that the police are indeed the agents of law.

b. It is meet and proper to focus here on the issue of the stereotype of police behaviour. Undisputedly, a pervasive facet of poor quality of police conduct is the bane of the police of today. That gross shortcoming has to be corrected if the police aspire to win the public good will. Developing and building the right “police attitudes” would perhaps be the biggest welcome change in the total effort to improve the police. In that compelling context, the key to develop the needed egalitarian police ethos can be found only when the police moves collectively as well as individually in terms of bringing about a change in the integrated results of Knowledge, Skill and Regimentation in their work actions. Though changing the police attitudes may appear to be very difficult on a spur of the moment or even over a short period of time, it should be possible for the leadership to enforce minimum standards in relation to the conduct patterns of the average rank and file.

c. In order to strengthen a long-term approach on this elemental need, it may be desirable to evolve a more comprehensive recruitment policy. The job dimensions of the police are such that the tasks have to be accomplished by persons having an ideal blend of head and heart. Somehow the current induction doctrines into the police ranks seem to reflect that the total range of the police jobs oscillates between mechanical type of works and occasional semi-skilled activities. As a result of this dichotomy, the productivity of an average constable is getting reduced systematically and that perhaps is the single biggest shortcoming of the system. We have to clearly focus in getting better and more qualified persons into the system and slowly make them more and more capable by training and supervision.

IV. Use “Training” as the main tool to improve the most needed professionalism amongst the personnel

a. Key to elevate the police professionalism is surely the “Training”, which somehow has become a stepchild in most of the police organizational policies and planning. As a large number of activities are really skilled type of works, the need to make the police ranks more competent is the only way out. Some of the brilliant examples of many advanced and really successful police systems disclose that a better-qualified police officer would grasp a really well evolved professional training to become a better and more effective policeman. Further, it seen that there is tremendous support in those lands for all ranks to improve their own knowledge and skill base on a continuous basis by several supportive arrangements.

V. Build a strong Community- Police Partnership – the only insurance for the future of the police in a democracy

Involving the community is the key to police success and this aspect has been not fully utilized by the leadership both at the executive and at the political levels. Ensuring a systematic public education and eliciting their support is a non-stop effort, which the concerned have to plan and pursue. There are several dimensions to this elemental facet of getting the people’s support. Alas, there is really no steady policy in most of the nations as indicated by the obtrusive fact that there is no law or strategy, which invokes the measures that are concomitant with various styles of community policing and therefore, filling this glaring deficiency should be a primary task on the police leaderships.

VI Seek media help with a sound Police- Media policy for an egalitarian way of life

The fundamental need for developing and sustaining a sound Media Policy to advance police effectiveness and also ensure the community goodwill warrants no emphasis. A strategy, which generates continuous awareness levels of the people on all essential facets of law enforcement, is vital for the growth and nourishment of democracy. An enlightened and civic-minded society is the best insurance for an egalitarian milieu. Such an environment would surely call for a vigilant media and to advance that cause, a Media- Police relationship built on the concept of a ‘healthy and constructive tension’ would help the police to effectively ensure an internal vigil. As a corollary the system would also stand scrutiny of a continuous social audit, which is indeed the lifeline for a Jeffersonian way of life.

VII. Reforms in other wings of the Criminal Justice System

The political, administrative, social and professional leaders would do well to seek improvements in all facets of the Criminal Justice System so that the benefits of improvements in the penal processes would be meaningful enough to fight the slowly pervading cynicism about the real value of the democratic way of life and the concept of rule of law. There is a justifiable apprehension that the people’s confidence, world over in the efficacy of the legal systems is waning rapidly or is at a grave risk. Unless such pessimistic and helpless notions are not reversed, all our efforts to realize the eminently desirable goals and ideals of Constitutional governance will be shattered.

VII. International Cooperation

It needs no special mention that in the coming times, most important threats to peace and order as well as crimes of the new kind will have an international bearing. It is in this specific area that work may have to done to evolve common strategies to fight crime and disorder. Making the needed legal framework including measures of simplifying the process of bringing offenders to book, (by wise and well got up extradition and other arrangements would be a necessary step. Building bridges and partnership to learn and mutually help the law enforcement forces would be a sure way of promoting good neighborly approach which will mean the best for a peaceful world.

To sum up, the prescience of National Security of all nations in their respective internal dimensions could be answered competently only when they (the police) become responsible, responsive and effective in a democratic ambience. If they are able to accomplish that at least to a great extent, then they can hope to stay relevant. In that quest, a catalytic spur of life can be given to the police systems by systematically addressing suo-moto some of the vital issues. That innate urge and a burning desire to fulfill those enviable aspirations must become apparent from within.