INTRODUCTION
Politics is a study of state and government and, of course, it cannot be studied in isolation being
inextricably linked with the society, as the interdependence of state and society is all-pervasive.
"Politics is concerned with the conditions and consequences of human action" (Hans Eulau).
Politics, as an activity, is the discourse and the struggle over the organisation of human possibilities.
It is about the capacity of social agents, agencies and institutions to maintain or transform their
environment, social or physical. Politics is a phenomena also found in and between institutions and
societies. It addresses all the relations, institutions and structures that have an influence, implication
in the life of societies. Politics creates and conditions all aspects of our lives and it is at the core of
the development of collective problems, and the modes of their resolution. The study of politics
involves much more than the study of the state as it is enmeshed in the societal structures and the
way both conditions each other. It is a fundamental requirement, as a part of the inter-disciplinary
approach of politics, to understand the dynamics of the relations and processes of the state and their
place in shaping society.
THE PROBLEM
State and Security- Coercive Apparatus and Social Order:
The State as an enduring form of human association has served its purposes at the various phases of
its development, since individuals' search for security led to its evolution. The aspect of individual
security relates to social threats in various forms like physical threats, economic threats and threats to
position or status, which are not mutually exclusive. The existence of these threats to individuals'
security within the context of human society points to the great dilemma, as to, how to balance the
freedom of action for the individual against the potential and actual threats which such freedom
poses to others. 1
In consideration of the emergence of the state based on the contractarian theoretical
assumption of the 'state of nature' image, that postulates a primal anarchy in which the conditions
for the individuals involved are featured by unacceptably high levels of social threats, viz., chaos and
disorder, the state becomes the only mechanism by which people seek and achieve adequate levels of
security against social threats. 2
Changes in the material conditions of society and its structures led to changes in the notions
of the state. As society develops around the state, it becomes increasingly dependent on the state as a
lynchpin for other social and economic structures. As the symbiosis of society and state develops
along more complex, sophisticated and economically productive lines, the 'state of nature' image
becomes more and more unappealing as an alternative. The state, then, is irreversible and
indispensable. There is no real viable option of going back, and the security of individuals is
intrinsically entangled and fused with that of the state.
Thus, security and society hang together and constitute an existentially inseparable unity.
The principal cause of security is the fundamental offshoot for a peaceful life. The observational field
of the social scientist - social reality - has a specific meaning and relevance for the human being
living, acting, and thinking within it. Engaged in a life of interdependence, living their daily life
within their social world, the thinking men [sic] of the society produces an 'order', through a social
1 Barry Buzan, Peoples, States and Fear: The National Security Problem in International Relations, Whearsheaf Books Ltd., Sussex, 1983, pp. 18-20.
2 Ibid.
process, evolved by using a series of common-sense constructs to pre-select and pre-interpret this
world which they experience as the reality of their daily lives. In contrast to the assumption treating
human beings as objects for practical purposes of scientific inquiry contained in correctional
criminology, the approach of symbolic interactionist theory to problematise the social world with
the view that humans are conceived as subjects because their behaviour is subjectively meaningful;
the socially meaningful character posits man [sic] as the author of action.
It is a matter of sociological 'common-sense knowledge' that the construction of social order
is a societal project and the means for its formulation involved the use of values, norms and beliefs
by members of society. It also follows as endorsed by the sociologists that these norms, values and
beliefs in turn give rise to 'problems', as socially defined. Therefore, the construction of social. order
and along with the identification of certain forms of human behaviour and activities categorising
them as undesirable in terms of the given and accepted notion of social order constitute social
processes. An explanation of social processes that include an examination of the processes of social
interaction rests on three simple premises of symbolic interactionism:
• Human beings act towards things on the basis of meanings that the things have for them.
• The meanings of such things is derived from, or arises out of, the social interaction that one has with one's fellows in the society, and
• These meanings are handled in, and modified through, an interpretative process used by the person in dealing with the things he encounters. 3
How certain forms of behaviour are ascribed as undesirable depends on the meanings attributed to
it. Certain acts that contain unacceptable properties, construed as undesirable pass through the
interactional and organisational processes of what particular meaning is conferred on it, how the act
is interpreted by following a set norm and then selected and identified as profane - the cause of
social problems.4
Thus according to Spector and Kituse, social problems may be conceptualised as those
activities that impinges on the context creating certain forms of conditions and circumstances
claimed and defined as problems by governments, the media, the private and public welfare agencies,
as well as problem spokespeople amongst the general public. In other words, social problems are
defined as
the activities of individuals or groups making assertions of grievances and claims with respect to some putative conditions. The emergence of a social problem is contingent upon the organisation of activities asserting the need for eradicating, ameliorating, or otherwise changing some condition.5
Social problems, then a product of social interactionism, reflect what members of society are
concerned about, what they claim something should be done about, what people find undesirable
and in need of eradication. The most fundamental and overarching of these concerns is the problem
of 'social order' .6
Christopher Morris considers basic security of persons and possessions as 'social order' and
threat to that interest of security is a threat to 'social order'. Both Morris and Michael Taylor
conceive 'social order' as "public or collective good" and that life (of social interaction) without it is
undesirable because it is a precondition for the pursuit and attainment of a variety of desired ends.7
3 Stephen Hester and Peter Eglin, A Sociology of Crime, Routledge, London, 1992, pp. 8-11. 4 Ibid, pp. 10-11, 13. 5 Ibid, p. 1. 6 Ibid, p. 2. 7 Christopher Morris, A Hobbesian Welfare State and Michael Taylor, Social Order Without the State, in Andrew Levine
(ed.), The State and Its Critics, Vol. II, Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd., Aldershot, 1992, pp. 10-11, 42-48. 2
The individual has an absolute and inescapable dependence on society for the continuous
attainment of security. People do not stand merely as isolated individuals but as 'particulars' and as
'universals' and thus the quest for security (the provision for life and freedom) goes considerably
beyond the purview of sheer physical survival. This dependence takes a variety of forms and "the
degrees of interdependent action that societies evidently display," according to Giddens, in a social
world of interactional processes constitute social relations.
Society sees the prior necessity of imposing a central order on the inter-relations so that the
ends they severally pursue may be possibly harmonised and thus made attainable in organised
activity, treated as interactional accomplishments by ethnomethodology. Hence, for the regulation of
social relations in order to establish an operable social order and social cohesion, a central institution
characterised as the crowning point of the modern social edifice, takes over the maintenance and
development of the essential system of rights and obligations accepted by the society. Thus, the
production and recognition of social order as given is accomplished by a process: "the process
through which the perceivedly stable features of socially organised environments are continually
created and sustained" in observance of an internalised culture of a set of rules prescribing normative
behaviour that treats the members of society as oriented to rules in the course of their interactional
process designing their particular actions in accord with the rules. Rule-governed as the actions of
'rule-using creatures', the setting may be said to be organised by rules - an imposed set of
relevances. 8
Therefore, "seekers after security," man's [sic] dependence on society takes a variety of forms
and correspondingly 'society' displays a great multitude of manifestations in larger groupings and
formal institutions. The modern state emerged as the central social formation responsible and best
left in its capacities for the maintenance of society, secured its primacy over all other forms of human
associations and unequivocally and universally regarded so than any other social grouping as it
offered prospects of ordered peace.9
The security of individuals being immutably fastened to the state, the state as the dominant
political structure appears to be all-pervasive (in public and private life as well). To put it in a
formulation that captures the Weberian perspective, it regulated the conditions of our lives through
a system of continuous administrative, legal, bureaucratic and coercive apparatuses. Therefore, the
state is not an independent structure above society but deeply embedded in the total social processes
that attempt not only to structure relationship between civil society and public authority in a polity
but also to structure the functioning of society, at large, through a set of established laws. 10 In the
process of functioning of the state, arises the dilemma as to how to enhance the liberation of
community without amplifYing oppression by authority.
The state properly conceived is a set of administrative, policing, and military organisations
headed, and more or less well coordinated by, an executive authority. 11 The legitimate claims of the
modern state and its exercise of the structures of authority to regulate citizens' most vital interests as
8 Hester and Eglin, op. cit., pp. 14-17. 9 R.N. Berki, Security and Society: Reflections on Law, Order and Politics, J.M. Dent & Sons Ltd., London, 1986, pp.
27-28; Harold J. Laski, An Introduction to Politics, George Allen & Unwin, London, 1981, pp. 11-12; David Held, et al (eds.), States and Societies, Martin Robertson, Oxford, 1983, p. 2, also seen. 3, p. 47.
10 Barry Buzan, op. cit., p. 21; David Held and Joel Krieger, Theories of the State: Some Competing Claims, in S. Bornstein, et al (eds.), The State in Capitalist Europe, Allen & Unwin, London, 1983, p. 2; Theda Skocpol, Bringing The State Back In: Strategies of Analysis in Current Research, in P. Evans, et al (eds.), Bringing the State Back In, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985, p. 7.
11 Theda Skocpol, States and Social Revolutions: A Comparative Analysis of France, Russia and China, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1979, p. 29.
a mechanism or mode of social control is founded on the thesis that 'authority has its basis in traits
deeply rooted in the human mind as it answers the practical needs of society.' 12
Explaining state and governmental activities, Skocpol argues that any state first and
fundamentally extracts resources from society and invests the same to create and sustain
administrative and coercive organisations which are the basis of state power. 13 State activity is .a
process of intervention in a society, effected by institutions that are a condensation of material power
and nodal points of the relations of power within society. The state apparatus operationalises this
state power in the execution of the supreme rule-making, rule-applying, rule-adjudicating, rule
enforcing and rule-defending tasks of society. 14
The state performs its acts either directly or by express delegation of its monopolistic nature
of power through an arrangement of agencies totalising the notion of the dominant protective
association (sovereign over a given territory). The concentration of all physical force in the hands of
the central authority is the primary function of the state and its decisive characteristic. Under the
state form of rule, the state in delegating its power makes its delegate an agent (organ) of the state. 15
The basic need of states is to maintain their mechanistic role of social control that constitute
their domestic order-keeping functions governed by certain norms, values and beliefs - the means
used to construct social order also forms the foundational principle embodied in the constitutional
document. The paradigms of state intervention through its agencies, the scope and effectiveness of
such institution and the strategies employed guided by policies and programmes conditioned by the
existing structure of social relations, and the nature and direction of the development process
determines the pivotal role of the state as a mechanism of social control within a specific social
matrix. These interventions in turn determine 'justice' which is the first virtue of the state. 16
As an immense and bewildering subject opens up before one who contemplates the diversity
of arrangements and institutions through which justice is variously administered in modern states,
the contours of the justice-talk be delimited to the related parameters of society and security, the role
of state's order-keeping agency with its authoritative means (force or coercion) of acting as a mode of
social control, a 'specific social technique' as the jurist Hans Kelsen put it, 17 within a specific
historical social matrix.
Justice defined as the principle of fairness, the ideal of moral equity, in the truest sense of the
word, is the ultimate goal of criminal justice. Criminal justice and civil justice are both aspects of a
wider form of equity termed social justice. Social justice is a concept that embraces all aspects of
civilised life. It is linked to notions of fairness and to cultural beliefs about right and wrong.
Questions of social justice are social problems arising from social relations in an interactional process
of living in the social world, that is, relationship and linkages of all sorts. In the abstract, the concept
of social justice embodies the highest personal and cultural ideals. 18
Civil justice concerns itself with fairness in relationship between citizens, government
agencies and businesses in private matters involving contractual obligations, business dealings,
12 Leslie Green, The Authority of the State, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1988, pp. 1-4. 13 Theda Skocpol, op. cit. 14 Goran Therborn, What Does the Ruling Class Do When It Rules?, New Left Books, London, 1978, p. 133. 15 Robert Nozick, The State, in Andrew Levine (ed.), The State and Its Critics, Vol. I, Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd.,
Aldershot, 1992, pp. 206-07. 16 Theda Skocpol, 1985, op. cit., pp. 9-11; Leslie Green, op. cit., p. 5 ; Zoya Hasan, Introduction: State and Identity in
Modem India, in Zoya Hasan et a! (eds.), The State, Political Processes and Identity: Reflections on Modern India, Sage Publications, New Delhi, 1989, pp. 10-12.
17 Leslie Green, ibid, pp. 5, 69-71. 18 Frank Schmalleger, Criminal Justice: A Brief Introduction, Second Edition, Prentice Hall, New Jersey, 1997, pp. 11-
13. 4
hiring, equality of treatment, and so on. Criminal justice, in its broadest sense, refers to those aspects
of social justice that concerns violations of the criminal law. The process of criminal justice
contributes to the achieving and maintaining of social order as a social control mechanism. 19
The criminal justice arrangements of the state as a social control mechanism supposes:
• The idea of law, an instrument of control, which is both institutionalised and systematic in nature that set limits on behaviour and define particular forms of social interaction as either acceptable or unacceptable. Laws are a primary device for the purpose of order creation in any mature society.
• The existence of specialised organs of the state for the interpretation, enforcement, and application of the rules for social ordering.
This systematic arrangement of authority is, thus, a triadic social relation among a supenor, a
subject, and a range of action that is interdependent.20
The criminal justice system involves a process characterised by an array of procedures and
activities having to do with the enforcement of the criminal law. The aggregate of all operating and
administrative or technical support agencies that perform criminal justice functions constitute the
criminal justice system. The agencies that contribute to the criminal justice ideals as a system
comprise of three major components: police, courts, and corrections. Traditionally, they function as
'justice practitioners' explicitly and specifically in this area of activity.21
The most dominant agency of the state's impersonal (legally circumscribed) structure is the
institution of police, the most visible manifestation of the state as it establishes an intrinsic and
symbiotic relationship with its operational context by virtue of its social ordering function.
lnternalising 'the essence of the state i.e. its coercive power'22 - 'a means specific to the
state'23 and the defining characteristic of the state24 - the police claims monopoly over the legitimate
use of non-negotiable force derived from the state, according to Weber, the sole authorizer of
violence and the sole effective judge over the permissibility of violence.25 Coercion guarantees the
reproduction of domination and order and suppresses challenges to state authority. In the course of
time, it helps to create conditions that allow for voluntary obedience to laws and their legitimation. 26
Assuming the state's protective role in ensuring order by enforcement of laws backed by the
legitimacy to use force when it thinks necessary, the police as an integral and foremost organ of the
state's paraphernalia of the criminal justice system sets into motion the process of criminal justice
which makes it stand out as an indispensable and distinct justice-dispensing organ of the state.
The state means all the institutions and relations associated with the government. 27 State's
monopoly of coercive power is in order to provide a secure basis for a smooth functioning of the
society. It is problematic in the sense that 'by granting the state a regulatory and coercive capability
it's understood that it could deprive citizens of political and social freedom'. 28 lnspite of the key
institutional innovation in 'representative democracy', the democratic constitutional state's problems
19 Ibid. 20 Ibid, p. 13; Mirjan R. Dama5ka, The Faces of justice and State Authority: A Comparative Approach to the Legal
Process, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1986, pp. 1, 9, 16, 87; Leslie Green, op. cit., pp. 42, 48. 21 Frank Schmalleger, ibid, pp. 14-27. 22 C.P. Bhambhri, The Indian State: Conflicts and Contradictions, in Zoya Hasan et al (eds.), op. cit., p. 74. 23 David Held, Political Theory and the Modern State, Worldview, Maya Polity, New Delhi, 1998, p. 40. 24 Kuldeep Mathur, The State and the Use of Coercive Power in India, Asian Survey, Vol. XXXII, No.4, April 1992, p.
337. 25 Robert Nozick, op. cit., p. 207. 26 Kuldeep Mathur, op. cit. 27 David Held, op. cit., p. 48. 28 See Roy R. Roberg and Jack Kuykendall, Police and Society, Wadsworth Publishing Co., Belmont, California, 1993,
PP· 4-13. 5
of ensuring both 'authority' and 'liberty' remams. How ts it so, requues conceptualising the
problem.
For most people, the police are the government and government identified with the state. 29
In reality, the 'government in ruling' assumes the state power and is the repository of state's
obligations to the society. Masse rightly observes that 'the police and its functions are determined by
the nature of the state which they serve and the theory upon which such a state is based'. 30 Or as
Bayley puts it aptly, "the police are to the government as the edge is to the knife."31 The state -
apparatus of' government' - appears to be all-pervasive, regulating the conditions of our lives. 32 It is
generally accepted that the nature of police activities provides an important insight into the nature of
the state as police are immediately identified with law. In many respects, they are more important
than law, for they are meant to implement its strictures and decide when it is to be applied.33 Besides
the discretionary power that the law attaches, it sanctions the police legitimate use of force for its
enforcement. Therefore, 'law has two moments one of order and that of coercion'.34
Bayley contends that it is generally held that the nature of police activities provides an
important clue to the character of a political regime, as the nature of police activities and that of the
government are coincidental. As the government can affect its own environment, the police can also
do so. Police are the leading edge of government regulation. Assuming state's regulatory and coercive
capabilities, police personifY government. The nature of the government is determined by the nature
of the police. If one constructs an index of the character of political life and an index of the character
of police operations, one would find a close correlation between the two as institutions which make
up 'the State' and whose relationship shapes the form of the state system. 35
Police bear the primary responsibility of the state of any formation, maintaining stable
conditions of social life. They are society's regulators, imbued with power denied to everyone else,
imbued with an emotional significance that does not attach to other agents of government. They
have the responsibility for safeguarding the most basic element of human life. Theirs is the power to
protect or not to protect, to save or not to save. Policemen are identified with greatest of life's
crisis. 36
The police can also play a formative role in the political and economic development of the
society through the things they do, the nature of the actions they perform. These actions impinge
upon the society at different points of contact.37 Both the nature of their activity that permeate all
corners of social life and its point of contact affect the 'conditions' in the society - 'order and
security', that epitomises the character of the state. 38 Hence on the basis of the nature of the state
and the dynamics of the function of its institutions, it can be maintained that whatever the
29 David H. Bayley, The Police and Political Development in India, Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, 1969, p.11.
30 George L. Mosse (ed.), Police Forces in History, Beverly Hills, 1975, p. 4. 31 David H. Bayley, op. cit. 32 David Held, op. cit., p. 11. 33 David H. Bayley, op. cit., p. 15, 21-23. 34 Franz L. Neumann, The Rule of Law: Political Theory and the Legal System in Modern Society, Berg Publishers
Ltd., Leamington Spa, 1986, p. 11. 35 David H. Bayley, op. cit., pp. 11-12, 15; David Held, op. cit., p. 49. 36 David H. Bayley, ibid, p. 14. 37 Ibid, pp. 14, 16; See Kalyani Saha, Police Administration in the Context of Development: A Case Study of West
Bengal, 1951-71, Ph.D. Thesis (Centre for Political Studies/School of Social Sciences), Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, 1985.
38 See R.N. Berki, op. cit., pp, 98-102. 6
government is, by men or by law, depends to a marked extent on the nature of the police.39 It
reflects the correlation between State-Law-Society.
The police, uniformed and concerned with 'social peacekeeping',40 are the most ubiquitous,
visible and important of all government agencies for the average citizen. What they do generally in
society and the relations they establish with the public by virtue of their role performance are
correlated.41 This state institution constitutes the subject matter of this study for what is discussed
above explains the most fundamental twin questions: Firstly, why should all modern societies find it
necessary to create and sustain such a mechanism, that is, the Police? And secondly, what does such a
mechanism make available to modern societies that no other institution can provide?
The conceptual understanding central to the relevance of embarking upon a study that
attempts to explore and examine, in an analytical and descriptive framework, the most crucial
component of the state's justice system is informed and shaped by the following constructed
theoretical overview:
The State forms a set of highly complicated relations and processes embedded in the society, with distinctive structure and sets of institutions, together with its nature as a site of political negotiation and conflict form a network functioning as a system. In order for the system to function, there must be a general compliance with the laws, rules, etc. This is ensured to maintain order by one of the component agencies of the criminal justice arrangement, in particular, and of the politico-administrative sub-system, in general, which constitute the core structure of the state - the police which enjoys the legitimate use of force in its operations. So crucial is this most visible 'hand of the state' that its said that 'even as crisis of legitimacy may occur among some of the political structures of the state, it should be stressed that it will still leave a social system quite stable so long as the system's coercive organisations with the civil police at its core remain effective.42
Therefore, though compliance for social ordering can be secured to a limited extent by coercion,
societies claiming to operate according to the principles of liberal, representative democracy depend
more on the existence of a widespread belief that the system adheres to the principles of justice,
equality and freedom. In today's highly complex societies populated by groups with a wide diversity
of interests, it is within this challenging context that while the daily practice of policing takes place it
interacts with the life, liberty and property of the individual and the community. This point to the
problem of police operations of how to maintain a balance between the activities of a 'restraining for
compliance-seeking' authority and liberty and freedom of the individuals, in particular, and the
community, in general, within a democratic constitutional framework.43
CRIMINOLOGY AND SOCIAL SCIENCES: DEVELOPMENTS IN POLICE STUDIES
In popular culture 'cop' and 'robbers' is a conceptual couple, the former perennially chasing the
latter. In criminology until recently this was not the case. For most of its past, criminology focused
on 'robbers' and other 'miscreants', but the activities of cops and the agencies of the criminal justice
process generally remained outside its conscious purview.
There flourished a variety of competing discourses about crime, criminals and control prior
to the emergence of a positivist interpretation of criminology which coincided with the naming of
the new discipline in the late nineteenth century. In these proto-criminologies', the criminal justice
system was at the centre of analytic and policy concern. The eighteenth century 'classical' school
associated pre-eminently with Beccaria is often said not to be a 'criminology', as in that it did not
39 David H. Bayley, op. cit., p. 15. 40 See John Kleing, The Ethics of Policing, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1996. 41 David H. Bayley, op. cit., pp. 15, 19. 42 See David Held, op. cit.; R.N. Berki, op. cit. 43 See Roy R. Roberg and Jack Kuykendall, op. cit., pp. 6-7.
7
treat the particularity of the criminal as its problematic, instead was concerned primarily with
constructing a rational and efficient system of criminal law and justice.44
In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, there flourished a vigorous branch of
political economy known as the 'science of police'. This saw as its problematic the understanding of
crime and disorder and the development of appropriate policies for its prevention and control. Its
leading British exponent was Patrick Colquhoun, a Middlesex Magistrate and architect of the first
professional police force in Great Britain, best known today as one of the precursors of Peel's
Metropolitan Police. He signified the birth of an institution by saying that,
Police is an improved state of society. Next to the blessings which a nation derives from an excellent constitution and a system of general laws are those advantages which result from a well-regulated and energetic plan of police, conducted and enforced with purity, activity, vigilance and discretion. 45
The term 'police' was used then in a much broader perspective enveloping the whole craft of the
regulation of a social order. The criminal justice system per se- and a fortiori the police force- was
only a residual aspect of this project as policing then was seen as merely a small part of the whole
business of domestic government and regulation, its relevance strictly restricted to the understanding
and control of crime and disorder. Correctional criminology preoccupied with cause-effect relations
between various 'factors' and criminal behaviour treated human beings as objects. The birth of a
positivist 'science of criminology' in the late nineteenth century eclipsed the initial assumption while
problematising the explanation of 'criminality', earlier seen as a non-social defect of specific
individuals. 46
Even the subsequent development of sociological theories of crime, in the early twentieth
century, still excluded the functioning of policing and the criminal justice process from the
intellectual province of criminology. While the conceptual ambit of the discipline was debated it was
not suggested that the functioning of the police and other criminal justice institutions should be part
of the research or theoretical concerns of criminologists.
During the late fifties and early sixties of the twentieth century, an epistemological break
occurred in the criminological enterprise, which sailed under the banners of 'labelling theory' and
'naturalism' drawn from sociological approach of symbolic interactionism that has been something
of a passing phase from positivism paving the way for new forms of radical and critical criminology
within the structural conflict perspective and moving to other approaches like ethnomethodology.
The essential departure of the new approaches, besides considering social action as intersubjectively
meaningful, and crime as a social construction premised on the examination of the processes (and
contexts) of social interaction, was to make problematic, intellectually and politically as well, the
structure and functioning of criminal justice agencies. The police began to figure on the research
agendas of criminologists and other social scientists as a particular aspect of this intellectual
conjuncture.47
REVIEW OF POLICE LITERATURE
Review of available relevant literature is the most fundamental preliminary task that mark~ the
initiation of any research endeavour. After such an exercise in pursuit of this study, an observation
44 See Stephen Hester and Peter Eglin, op. cit. 45 K.S. Dhillon, Defenders of the Establishment: Ruler-Supportive Police Forces of South Asia, liAS, Shimla, 1998, p.
31. 46 Stephen Hester and Peter Eglin, op. cit., 8-12. 47 Robert Reiner, Policing and the Police, in Mike Maguire et a! (eds.), Oxford Handbook of Criminology, Clarendon
Press, Oxford, 1994, pp. 705-707; Stephen Hester and Peter Eglin, op. cit., pp. 7-26; Frank Schmalleger, op. cit., pp. 25-27; Stephen D. Mastrofski and Craig D. Uchida, Transforming the Police, Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, Vol. 30, Issue 3, August 1993, pp. 330-58 (Source: EBSCO Database: Academic Search Elite).
R
can be made, albeit may be debatable depending on one's expectation relevant to the respective
interest(s), that it is scarcely surprising to those cognizant of the available police literature to find a
marked generic difference between the Indian and international works. Secondly, a social science
student striving to initiate a research on any specific topic in police studies would find the literature
on the subject in a paradoxical state.
The issue is the difference between Indian and Anglo-American literature or pieces of work
exploring various aspects of policing. Police scholarship in India is conspicuous by its absence as the
discipline has been elusive to social science research. On the contrary, works of international social
scientists whose theoretically informed and empirically grounded studies have developed the 'science
of police' that has shaped the fundamental understanding of modern policing characterised by its
more complex role and expansive functions. American and British literature on police and policing
are among the most unique of the politico-sociological or socio-legal scholarship due to their
theoretically-driven empirical police research in the last three decades.
Barren of theoretically-oriented police research, Indian literature are generally narration of
policework experiences or commonplace perceptions of the police informed by secondary sources.
Insightful as it is found to be are international literature because of their innovative scholarship and
application of relevant methodologies in police research that helps generate credible information
base for developing policy proposals of policing technologies. Indian literature lack in these respects
and it is surprising that social science scholars, especially of law and society, show either indifference
or no interest in pursuing questions or problems of policing. After all, the police remain central not
only to the operations of law, coercion, authority, and legitimacy in any modern society, in general,
but affects the lives of individuals and collectivities. It is all the more surprising when it is found that
the most sensitive subject in the public discourse is about policing issues which is prompted by daily
police activities creating news in the media.
The available literature on Indian police is predominantly general pieces of commentaries on
variety of police issues without any topical focus. The glaring missing elements are empiricism and
in-depth analysis, and conceptualisation of issues on 'police and policing' that could provide a
grounding to build relevant theories based on various perspectives. The police as an institution in
the Indian context or setting imbue a lot of relevance for it reflects in the independent era a 'post
colonial' structure, a continuity of an imperial largesse to independent India's criminal justice
administration. The study of the operational context or the setting and within it the dynamics of
policework processes are not substantially presented in the works of Indian authors in comparison to
that of Anglo-American scholars. The significant variables relevant to policing remain largely
unidentified and therefore not discussed in form of particularities which can all be gathered from
discussions and studies on the police in reference to the Anglo-American alliance of police system,
that is, mainly North America and Britain. This is not an easy task due to the complexities of the
police phenomena; an engagement in such an affair can be well-comprehended from the statement
of Bayley that, "police are a diffuse topic, not a researchable explicandum."48 And more so, the issues
handled in as wide a variety of societies, care be taken when co-relations are drawn onto and applied
into a local context. 49
Reflecting on specific issues of police science, historical accounts of the Indian police are
well-documented by some noted scholars like J.C. Curry (1932), Indian Police; Sir Percival Griffiths
48 David H. Bayley (ed.), Police and Society, Sage Publication, London, 1977. 49 R.I. Mawby (ed.), Policing Across the World: Issues for the Twenty-first Century, UCL Press, London, 1999, pp.
127-130. 9
(1971), To Guard My People: The History of the Indian Police; S.M. Edwardes (1983, rpt ed. of
1924), Crime in British India; Anandswarup Gupta (1974), Crime and Police in India (Upto 1861),
The Police in British India 1861-1947; K.S. Dhillon (1998), Defenders of the Establishment: Ruler
Supportive Police Forces of South Asia; among others. They document the evolution and growth of
this institution in the Indian sub-continent from the ancient, through the Moghul period to the
British colonial police system surviving into modern India as a product of the Indian Police Act
1861. They reflect on the organisational structure, roles and functions, policies and practices, values,
attitudes and functional styles of this institution as it developed under different political regimes in
successive periods of history. It helps understand and study the present police system as a part of the
state's administrative structure and to the extent in relation to its exact/actual operational sphere in
the district that has also historically evolved as the basic unit of administration in India.
This study will succinctly look into the historicity of the present police system based on the
assumption that study of colonial policing provides an important insight into the development of
policing in post-colonial countries which accounts for more than half of the total world population.
The colonial dimension provides a very interesting clue to examine its impact on post-colonial police
systems as existing literature maintains that the basis of the post-colonial state, in fact, is its colonial
past as it is found that many post-colonial countries have preserved in their new political structures
several features of the colonial regime, some practically in their original forms. This is particularly
true of policing as the present police system reflects the colonial baggage in its structural and
functional form. 50
R.K. Raghavan in the Epilogue to his latest book speaks about the Indian literature as thus:
"There is actually a case for serious and credible literature on the Indian police."51 As he points out
the lack of reviews about the existing police system, that is, the methods of policing and policework
processes, his book, he proclaims is in the direction of, at least partially, meeting international
standards.
The extensive body of writing on the Indian police, a dynamic institution within a liberal,
democratic and constitutional framework in a highly complex society, is usually by police
practitioners (serving and retired members of the Indian Police). Since the inspiration for such
efforts may be genuine admiration for the profession they serve(d), their works reflect a celebratory
and uncritical perspective, and merely constitute a 'cop-sided' version, narration of their experiences.
The other authors on Indian police are S.C. Misra, P.O. Sharma, K.M. Mathur, Jayatilak Guha
Roy, Rama Kant, James Vadackumchery, Mehartaj Begum, Syed M. Afzal Qadri, et al.
As regards the objectives of this study and the issues of policing it deals on, there is
absolutely scanty literature available on the practices and procedures of policework which include the
laid down procedural laws and in fact that in actual practice, the normative attitudinal and
behavioural aspects of policing, along with the socio-cultural traits unique to the organisation and its
personnel and its influence on their policing approach. P.O. Sharma laments unequivocally, "scanty
literature is available about the methods and procedures adopted and followed by the Indian
police ... "52 The only substantial book on statutory policework is by Syed M. Afzal Qadri. He deals
50 D.M. Anderson and D. Killingray (eds.), Policing the Empire: Government, Authority and Control 1830-1940, Manchester University Press, Manchester, 1991; M. Cain, Trends in the Sociology of Police Work, International Journal of the Sociology of Law, No. 7, 1979; R.I. Mawby, Comparative Policing Issues, Unwin Hyman, London, 1990; Bankole A Cole, Post-Colonial Systems, in R.I. Mawby (ed.), 1999, op. cit.
51 R.K. Raghavan, Policing a Democracy: A Comparative Study of India and the US, Manohar Publishers, New Delhi, 1999, p. 277.
52 P.D. Sharma, Indian Police: A Developmental Approach, Research Publications, Delhi, 1977, pp. 186-188. 10
with the most critical element of policework, the power of discretion and its likely use at every stage
of their functioning. 53
'Discretion' and 'occupational culture' or 'cop culture' are significant aspects in any matter
of police studies. Problematising and conceptualising such features of policing issues are crucial
inputs to understand existing methods and practices of policework, perspectives and approaches of
policing, and its implications, especially on the policed. Such information is hardly found in the
reviewed Indian literature, rather drawn for the purpose of this study from Anglo-American
sources.54
Another area of policing issue is the relation between the police and its operational context
that has a direct bearing on police activity and their role performance. Policework (e.g. crime
prevention) are only part of the related dimensions of state and society. The concept, 'good police
community relations quintessential to effective policing', necessitates a symbiosis between the two
bodies. It has both behavioural and system significance. The Police Commission 1902-03 realises
this,55 reiterated by the National Police Commission.56 The Central Committee Report on Police
Training, 1973 also accepts the need for training measures to improve police-public relations. 57
Almost all Indian literature deals on this increasingly significant policing issue. A lot of
writing on this aspect attracted the attention of several state governments as also the Centre. Several
State Commissions in their respective reports endorses this point and suggests police administrators
to take steps toward building and strengthening of police-community relations. Bayley's work
(1969) is still considered to be the most seminal study on the Indian police as it deals, besides on the
organisation and procedures, on the position and role of the police as a unit within its served setting,
and the attitudinal aspects of both the police and the public. It explores such issues through a field
survey. A major shortcoming of his empirical study is the lack of focus on the operations of the
cutting-edge level. Nevertheless, his study appreciably informs us about the responsibilities of an
agency administrating justice under law in a plural and democratic setup, their drawbacks and
limitations. 58
While talking of reforms for improving police effectiveness or efficiency, a host of literature
is produced on this area of police-community relations by police practitioners and scholars, engaged
in designing different strategies over successive period of time aimed at bettering police-community
relations. The latest innovation in policing style or strategy that has caught the eyes and ears of
police scholars, administrators and policy-makers the world over since the past three decades is the
concept of community-oriented policing or community policing. Its popularity as the panacea of all
policing ills has attributed phenomenal significance to the concept which has revolutionised policing
strategies so much that its said to have led to the emergence of the sociology of 'modern policing' in
53 Syed M. Afzal Qadri, Police and Law: A Socio-Legal Analysis, Gulshan Publishers, Srinagar, 1989. 54 For a rheoretical and analytical discussion of the inter-related factors that influence policework, see Chapter land 3. 55 David H. Bayley, 1969, op. cit., p. 197. 56 National Police Commission devotes an entire chapter in its Fifth Report, November 1980. It can also be seen rhat rhe
service aspect of the police has remained the primary concern and rhe only basic premise of rhe Commission's effort in its suggestions for recommendations to reform the Indian police system.
57 National Police Commission, Fifth Report, November 1980, MHA, Government of India, New Delhi; James Vadackumchery, National Police Commission: Issues for Rerhinking, APH Publishing Corporation, New Delhi, 1998, pp. 117-137; Arvind Verma, National Police Commission in India: An Analysis of the Policy Failures, The Police Journal, Vol. LXXI, No.3, July-September 1998, pp. 226-244.
58 David H. Bayley, op. cit.; Other empirical work on police and public relations are by Alphonse L. Earayil & James Vadackumchery, Rama Kant, U.N. Biswas, D. Sundar Ram, V.K. Mohanan, Sultan Akbar Khan and a few others. It is to be noted rhat the National Police Commission had conducted a nation-wide survey through the Indian Institute of Public Opinion for its own study, which has been till date the only broad-based, national level attempt made to study police-public relations.
II
social science. Highly rich and substantial research material on this field is available internationally,
as they come mostly from North America and Great Britain experiences where it has become the
new policing mantra, invariably adopted and implemented by the police leadership.
Insightful scholarship on such policing technologies is produced in great numbers available
in the form of books, assessment and evaluation reports, and articles. It seems that of all issues,
community policing has emerged as a slogan for a virtuous police administration given their bitter
histories and images that forms the subject matter of the current police academics, police-policy
audience as well as proposers, and journalistic studies. But one could notice when reviewing
literature on this topic that researchers and scholars have not paid equal attention to other countries
where community policing and other proactive policies are adopted by police systems, for e.g. Japan,
Singapore, Mexico, Australia, India and many more.
Rl. Mawby' s edited book shows how global has this police-policy become that scholars now
examine the possibilities of importing or transplanting police practices from one country to
another.59 Its clear that a whole range of current policing issues are just as relevant in an
international context as they are locally. The production of international literature on police by
people of various disciplines has become so frequent that the task of keeping up with the same
relevant to one's interest is daunting. At the same time, it is difficult not only to find similar works
on India but research on the need, form and mechanics of implementation of such innovative
policing strategies in the Indian context is largely missing. After all, it is informed through very little
literature that is available on programmes of proactive policing that has been initiated in select places
in India. Certainly, it can be said that community policing has not enthused the most supposed to
be concerned quarters of the citizenry, that is, the governments, police administrators, and policy
makers.
RESEARCH DESIGN
Based on the theoretical assumptions and constructs drawn from the review of literature relating to
the work processes of the police and its relation with the community, the study derives some basic
hypotheses to examine the relevance of the same in regard to the dynamics of police operations at
the quotidian level following a structured methodology.
Hypotheses:
• State practices often outlive their original jurisdictions, and state bodies often outlive the regimes
that created them.
• The determination of policework in actual practice is achieved by the interplay of a variety of
processes and pressures, within and outside of the police organisation.
• As a form of social control, the police are not an autonomous institution, free-standing and
independent but reflect the social context in which they operate that affects and influences
police activity.
• In plural societies, policing is inextricable from larger social relations and thus tends to be highly
politicised, arguably biased in its disposition, and lacking in effective structures of
accountability.
• Because coercive social control is a feature of stratified societies with strong inclinations toward
individualism where the police are the most visible embodiment of those societies, conflict
59 R.I. Mawby (ed.), 1999, op. cit. 12
between the police and the public, in general, and between the police and those persons whom
society marginalises is prevalent.
Objectives of the Study:
The interest in routine policing, that is, actual police practice and in the process its relation with the
served community, was primarily evoked not only by the lack of satisfactory explanations of
policework in the existing literature, the specific content of actual police activities in particular, but
most importantly, their collective failure to offer an adequate framework for understanding
organised policework. This work is informed by a particular concern: this state agency impinges on
its operational context unlike any other state institutions by virtue of its functions, the nature of its
activities and its existential reflection symbolic of one who is remembered by all in distress.
It is said that the study of police is a way of seeing the mechanism by which authority and
control were exercised and maintained historically. It points at two realisations. First, the study of
policework gains salience primarily because of two instruments in it possession: the monopoly to use
non-negotiable coercion and the power of discretion that pervades all policework. Second, such an
assumption suggests an approach in the study that provides for a contemporary test of the historical
evidence of police practices.
This study discusses the dynamics of the policework processes at the quotidian level that
forms the cornerstone of policing, from the normative point of view and in actuality incorporated
from the body of knowledge existent in the available literature and necessary empirical findings.
How such police practices impact upon the relationship between the police and the community and
its prevalent conditions is also examined. The study looks into the relations between the police and
the public not from a perspective that considers police task as that of the uniformed authority of the
state absolving any role of the public in the process of everyday policing.
The study deals on the theoretical accounts and explanations of the specificities and
complexities of policework processes, that is, the structural determinants and other fundamental
factors that influence their actual functioning. The perspective employed is both descriptive and
analytical in nature. To explain daily police operations in a characteristic setting like India, an
attempt is made to integrate the important theoretical foundations and critical research findings on
contemporary practices in a comprehensible, yet analytic, manner.
Methodology:
The routine operations of the police have never been a central concern of police studies and research
in India. Nevertheless, difficulties in terms of research access to the police may often have been a
hindrance to such studies. As, Jerome H. Skolnick suggests that one of the virtues of democratic
society is the obligation police themselves may feel for self-analysis and improvement, including the
willingness to have themselves studied on the task of policing by a potentially critical student of
social science. He is emphatic about the entitlements of the police in return for an objective and
tenable interpretation in the description and analysis of their work.60 But ways of policework is an
area of dark secrets that necessitates appropriation of a range of research tools which will enable the
study to realise the research agenda which has been laid out.
An attempt is made to explain the necessary elements for an adequate framework to
understand organised policework. In other words, it will provide the background and underpinnings
to examine how the police currently operate for which the methods adopted had to be such that they
60 Jerome H. Skolnick, Justice Without Trial: Law Enforcement in Democratic Society, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., New York, 1966, p.22.
13
are capable of illuminating the relationship between structures that influence and determine
policework processes. These processes, for instance, involve considerable creative adaptations in
particular settings, including the anticipation of conflict and the devising of tactics to work around
it, and also the tactic of avoiding conflict through non-decision-making (that includes decisions not
conforming to legal principles).61 These processes cannot be decoded or predicted from textual
resources. Thus, the need of primary empirical research. To adequately explain the dynamics of
police operations and its relation with the demos demands an approach that seeks to supplement and
enrich text-based analyses with the findings of empirical research that also includes for instance
ethnographic exploration of lives and activities of the governing and the governed that rarely filters
through the researcher-friendly medium of texts as "surface social practices are not simply
epiphenomena of textual discourses."62
The emphasis upon the work processes of the police reqwres the selection of such
techniques that makes access possible to the fullest possible significant range of policework. To do
this requires a combination of methods that can bring out the realities of police practices unto the
surface as much as possible. As Donald Fiske points out: "Each method is one basis for knowing,
one discriminable way of knowing," that is, there is a certain degree of "method specificity" in each
form of data collection. Thus, to minimise the degree of specificity of certain methods, it is
theoretically advantageous to triangulate methods as it would also not only help in checking the level
of consistency in the findings yielded by different methods but as a result, the validity of those
findings is also increased. It has the benefit of raising the researcher "above the personal biases that
stem from single methodologies."63 Thus to overcome the deficiencies that flow from employing one
method, triangulation as a research strategy is ideal and mandatory for research on an institution like
the police, that, as stated before, dearly have a lot of dark secrets. The nature of such research
endeavour necessarily require dependence on a source for expert knowledge that help inform the
researcher to develop ideas about police and direct the research work in a constructive and
meaningful manner. The constant source of such orientation to this study has been the critical
professor, besides police and law practitioners.
Police and the community constitute a symbiosis as the policework at the quotidian level is
not an isolated activity with the police situated autonomously above society. It is essentially an
interactive process between the two entities. Therefore, the empirical enquiry will strive to explore
the policework and to measure the dimensions of police impact upon the community. The
dimensions of this empirical study involve appropriation of research tools that would necessitate
making distinctions, marking limits, setting out conditions and reducing processes to their elements.
The empirical investigation focuses on both qualitative and quantitative techniques, that is,
participant-observation and in-depth personal interviews (that would uncover that which texts may
not reveal), besides documentary research (that consists not merely review and analysis but
investigations too into the archival data obtained from police records, the textual representations of
everyday practices, that arguably embody official mentalities of rule in the practices that could
denote a culture and also provide a knowledge of the settings in which they are produced). These
sources are made complementary with the aim to collect data on specific objectives that constitute
the detailed reality of day-to-day policework.
61 Kevin Stenson, Crime Control, Governmentality and Sovereignty, in Russell Smandych (ed.), Governable Places: Readings on Governmentality and Crime Control, Ashgate-Dartmouth, Aldershot, 1999, p. 59.
62 Ibid, pp. 58-59. 63 Chava Frankfort-Nachmias and David Nachmias, Research Methods in the Social Sciences, Fifth Edition, St. Martin
Press, New York, 1996, pp. 204-06. 14
Direct knowledge of a community's orientation to policing issues, e.g. to know how police
relate to a member of the public or the public relate to police activities, is best acquired through
systematic first-hand data collection with representatives samples of the community's population.
For many of the issues, which concern the police and the public, surveying both the public and the
police could be the way to obtain the desired information- "if you want to know what the citizens
think and feel, you must ask them." In short, to know what the police and the community thinks
about a subject, one should choose a methodology that asks the concerned in a direct and systematic
way.64
Thus, the sampling approach was defined by the following considerations: talking with key
persons "in-the-know" within the community and the organisation; and taking focus groups as a
technique as they were particularly useful for assessing opinions of relevant sub-groups within a
community, e.g. categories based on socio-economic criteria. The survey technique adopted was a
structured interview schedule, focused and clinical in nature, administered by the researcher
personally. The construction of the interview schedule was designed to elicit objective information
from factual questions, as also questions about subjective experiences involving the respondents'
beliefs, feelings, attitudes, and opinions. Two sets of interview schedules were employed, one to elicit
responses from the police personnel of the identified police-stations and the other from the 'publics',
residing in the jurisdictional area of these respective police-stations. As the interview schedule was
the same for both rural and as well as urban or a mixed geographic region, the schedule had to
necessarily contain contingency questions along with filter questions. In the process of administering
the structured interview schedule personally, the researcher in rare cases had to have the preference
of making the enquiry not a matter of 'off-the-cuff' responsive exercise but a partially exploratory
one providing space to the interviewee to elicit more information, wherever felt necessary. Here, in
fact, 'probing' as an instrument was employed to obtain the most complete responses, on critical
issues of everyday policing, from only those sample units that were understood to have experienced
the phenomenon of interest and could relate to them by reconstructing their experiences.
The interview schedule meant for the police of the four identified police-stations had
questions that were largely open-ended though there were dose-ended questions too. These
questionnaires were constructed, to a certain extent, with the aid of similar empirical studies on the
police, for instance, that of David H. Bayley, Alphonse L. Earayil and James Vadackumchery, and
others.
Survey methodologies have its own peculiar shortcomings, namely, the subpopulation that
constitute the sample selected for the study as representative of the whole stands against the non
feasibility of interviewing every member of the universe of study leaving unattended the presumptive
potential resourceful members of the community, the limitations of extending survey conclusion of
one sampled area to the other for comparative analysis, and the element of non-reliability of the
responses elicited, howsoever marginal it may be, is significant in research on subjects that involve
the monopoly of legitimate use of force. Therefore, measures were taken to minimise the effect of
these in conducting a sound survey.
For removing any error in the data as well as to supplement the same that is obtained from
the opinion surveys, other methodological techniques were also adopted to enlarge the particular
bodies of knowledge on policework and police-community relations, respectively.
64 David H. Bayley, op. cit., p. 5; Quint C. Thurman and Michael D. Reisig, Community-Oriented Research in an era of Community-Oriented Policing, American Behavioural Scientist, Vol. 39, Issue 5, March-April 1996, pp. 570-86 (Source: EBSCO Database: Academic Search Elite).
15
The innovative method ot measunng results through documentary research, tnat Is, stuoymg
of police records vs. follow-up interviews of the victims/complainants',65 involved the studying of the
First Information Reports (FIRs) registered at all the four thanas, during the year 2002, and the
Station Diaries (SDs) of the same year as well as that of during the period of research (2003-04) of
the said thanas. The Inspection Reports of the supervisory officers on the concerned thanas to which
the researcher could have access to as well as the selected entries of the SDs were analysed using
content analysis. The above government/official documents and reports yield credible (evaluative)
information, as they serve as records of evidence of events as they occurred rather than being
constructed later. The FIRs were categorised in terms of the nature of alleged offences and from it
were selectively chosen some cases, at least one each from every category of offences as well as those
that, on the basis of certain considerations, were felt important by the researcher after examining the
original complaints, on the basis of which the FIRs were registered.
The FIRs were then treated in a way to determine the public's access to the police, the
complainants' experiences during the process of filing the FIRs and the registration of the same, the
police response and the behaviour of the 'publics' (complainants, accused, and witnesses) during the
follow-up processes of the FIRs. Such information were collected by personal interviews with the
complainants, victims, and the accused as mentioned in those FIRs, and from all the entries made in
the SDs regarding police action in the respective cases.
The SD entries related to all kinds of complaints received by the thana, its treatment by the
police, and all other activities at the thana including those that are a part of the routine policing were
studied to know about the kinds of interpersonal problems, public expectations, and what all that
constitutes policework. To that regard, some of those entries regarding complaint filed by the
citizens that were not registered as cognizable cases were also examined in a similar fashion as done
in case of the FIRs. The Station Diary as per the Police Manual is a complete record of all
occurrences as they take place at the thana.66 It will thus serve as the most vital source of information
on the daily operations of the police. The fact that it is obligatory on part of the SD in-charge to
make an entry every two hours to record any occurrences at the thana, it is considered to be the
mirror reflection of the police activities. Thus examination of the findings of the investigations into
the unregistered complaints and registered FIRs and the textual representations in the SD of the
processing of the respective cases by the police would provide bodies of knowledge about the actual
police practices in all its dimensions and its meaning in reference to the concrete conditions that has
produced them that includes the roles of the 'publics'67• The veracity of the police records would
obviously come under scrutiny.
An effort was also made to enlist some incidents in the community related to both situations
that had the potential of turning into a case of disorder and actual problems of disorder to elicit
information on the roles of the police and publics in such situations.
65 The victim and complainant of a case may be two different persons. Expressions in Section 190(l)(a) & (c) of Cr.P.C. clearly means that as a general rule, any person, having knowledge of the commission of an offence may set the law in motion by a complaint, even though the informant is not personally interested or affected by the offence (exceptions to this rule are ss. 195 and 198). Ganesh Narayan Sathe, (1889) 13 Born 600; Keshavlaljekrishna, (1896) 21 Born 536; Vishwa Mitter v. D.P. Poddar, 1984 Cr LJ 1: AIR 1984 SC 5. Ratanlal & Dhirajlal's The Code of Criminal Procedure by Ratanlal Ranchhoddas and Dhirajlal K. Thakore, 15'h Edition (Revised by Justice Y.V. Chandrachud, et a!), Wadhwa and Company Law Publishers, Nagpur, 2002, pp. 293-298.
66 See Appendix A for detail information on the police documentation of its activities called the Station Diary. 67 It includes the injured parry (victim/complainant), witnesses, accused, representatives of the community and also that
of both the parties, if any, the gentry, and members of the civil society institutions with whom the police may have institutional contact.
16
The observation method was also employed to increase the validity of the findings from the
above techniques. Several of the most important social science studies of the police have been based
on a participant-observer methodology. Participant-observer research, sometimes called field
research, is the most common technique used in qualitative research.68 A qualitative approach was
used for this study to help understand the idea of policework from the standpoint of the participants
(the police personnel and the members of the public as key constituents of policing).
The underlying reason for employing this research strategy was that to understand the
processes of policework, one need to be cognizant of the 'process' itself as the larger purpose was to
construct generalisations about the process. The firsthand knowledge obtained through this method
describes the observed phenomena as they occur in their natural settings. Therefore, "to study people
acting in the natural courses of their daily lives," a participant-observer must genuinely be prepared
to see the world through the eyes of his subjects. According to Skolnick, such a position does not
undermine scientific objectivity, unless science is limited to the narrowest sort of positivism. On the
contrary, scientific knowledge is enhanced, provided the participant-observer is neither captured nor
repelled by his subjects. It requires that the observer empathise with the situations of his subjects by
getting involved in the world of the researched. 69
The empirical investigations undertaken by this study ought not to be mistaken for that the
police conduct. It was an exploratory research whose purpose was not merely to reveal the extent of
deviations in police behaviour from the principles of legality as that much was assured. The emphasis
was to observe the impact of the environment on the researched to acquire the meaning of work to
the police itself, especially as derived from and reflects back upon societal ideas regarding worker
autonomy, the need for order and the rule of law. It was aimed at understanding the conditions
under which the police operate: to see rules as a context for the behaviour of legal men besides
organisational and situational requirements that often affect the actor's interpretation of laws. In
other words, a study of law-in-action is a study of men at work, interpreting and thereby
transforming principles and associated rules within the legal institutions.70
'Observations of practice' requires the researcher to be on the scene to observe the
behaviourial and attitudinal patterns of the police during actual assignments. To enable access to
such situations is a matter of achieving rapport with the police, as a kind of participation is required.
Erving Goffman described such process of actively participating in the daily life of the observed and
the gaining of insights by introspection in the following way: " ... a good way to learn about any of
these worlds is to submit oneself in the company of the members to the daily round of petty
contingencies to which they are subject." The researcher was thus required to attain some kind of
membership in or dose attachment to the group it wished to study. It depended on the skills of the
researcher to establish relationships with members of the group. This reminds of the suggestion of
Robert Park of the Chicago School: "so get the seat of your pants dirty in real research." According
to him, there may be initial frustration over attempts of how to gain entry into the group but
learning the ropes to establish relationships involved adopting variety of roles and strategies that are
invented spontaneously and adopted that blend with the demands of the particular research setting.
That important phase of the researcher's attempt at socialising, establishing social relations with the
observed and gaining acceptability among them was the central aspect of fieldwork. In doing so, the
68 Roy R. Roberg and Jack Kuykendall, op. cit., p. 141; Chava Frankfort-Nachmias and David Nachmias, op. cit., p. 206. 69 Jerome H. Skolnick, op. cit., pp. 25-26, 41; Chava Frankfort-Nachmias and David Nachmias, ibid, pp. 206-07, 281;
Roy R. Roberg and Jack Kuykendall, op. cit., pp. 140-41. 70 Jerome H. Skolnick, ibid, pp. 26-27; Chava Frankforr-Nachmias and David Nachmias, ibid, p. 207.
17
researcher as participant-observer, by principle, attempted to adopt the perspective of the people in
the situation being observed (both police and the public). 71
When the researcher adopted this role, he informed the group being studied, that there was
a research agenda. The researcher's explicitly stated goal was to learn the processes of policework at
the thana level and for that purpose the interest was not in the names or personalities nor the thana
that was being observed. The researcher tried to spend more time with the subjects, share views on
the situational encounters and also participate in the daily life of the observed to make them get used
to his presence. For e.g. the researcher on an invitation from the In-charge of a thana sat through the
entire play from late evening to day break along with other officers. An element of artificiality and
caution still remained in the air. Some officers occasionally getting conscious of the fact that the
researcher was in company was noticeable. For instance, during a night patrolling in one of the rural
areas, a truck was stopped by the patrolling party and its carriage was checked. To evade police
search, the truck driver attempted to push something into the palm of the senior officer who
realising the researcher's presence spurned the act and immediately took him away into the dark. But
this artificiality cannot be overcome even when the observed is accustomed to the observer and do
not regard the latter as an intruder. As it is, the subject in encountering a situation cannot have the
opportunity to dissimulate than being customary. The subjects most often initiated discussion on
the work that was at hand or while enroute to encounter a situation that involved exchange of
opinions in an air of informality. The police realises that the researcher can easily learn about the
general pattern of policework that was observed. From many such experiences, one such moment
was when the researcher's willingness was sought to aid the police in nabbing a warrantee who had
been successful in evading arrest. The researcher on many occasions felt being considered by the
observed as an accomplice, if not as a fellow agent of social control. But still there could be a belief
that the researcher would not have been exposed to the "worst". Whatever that may mean, most of
what was observed was necessarily typical of the behaviour of the police, 'the normal policework'. It
is so because of the fact that the vague presence of an observer whom the police had given the
privileges to drop-in when they are at work would be at all a pertinent factor to alter their usual
behaviour than the effects of organisational controls.
The theoretical problem of the observation method was the difficulty to follow a 'time
sampling schedule'. It was not feasible too given the nature of the policework, that is, the focus of
observation was highly unpredictable in terms of the opportunity for the researcher to observe a
specific police activity that may occur at any moment of the day and night. More so, it also
depended on the consent and invitation of the officer to accompany them on any task.
The participant-observer also looked at the social world of the police that includes its
interface with the public to acquire a comprehensive understanding of organised policework.72
Hence, the observer belonged to either world. It was thus critical for him to strike a well-balanced
relationship with the observed and that required, according to Rosalie Wax, the fieldworker "to
maintain a consciousness and respect for what he is and a consciousness and respect for what his
hosts (observed) are."73
The researcher had to conduct elaborate observational work at strategic sites of policework,
to cover the full range of practices conducted all through the day and night. It meant accompanying
the police in its work, e.g. patrol, raid, enquiry, investigation, search and seizure, execution of
71 Chava Frankfort-Nachmias and David Nachmias, ibid, pp. 280-82, 288-89; Jerome H. Skolnick, ibid, p. 36. 72 Mike Brogden, eta!, op. cit., pp. 30-31. 73 Chava Frankfon-Nachmias and David Nachmias, op. cit., p. 289.
lR
warrants, attend to calls, processing of cases like Unnatural Death cases, etc. It also meant having
access, as much as possible, to the written statements relating to working practices: operational
guidelines and orders. It also meant to be cognizant of the background legal structure that informs
the work of the rank and file. Finally, it meant attention to police-public contacts of all kinds,
especially the nature of the citizens' contacting role as it is they who pose demands on modern
policework and influence policework practices: to contacts with complainants, victims, arrestees,
petitioners, community leaders, and organisational agents since these provided one important
empirical indicator of the presence of the working of democratic elements.74
The study of policework practices included the institutional processes as well as the function
of the informal processes that appeared to prevail variously either in juxtaposition or concomitant to
each other. The researcher, therefore, constantly found itself involved in the business of interpreting
the meaning of the behaviour of the observed, verbal and non-verbal, and that of the events in which
they were engaged in. It depended on the researcher how comprehensively it could reveal the world
of policework. But the fact remains that the success of observation method is dependent on factors,
namely, the willingness of the observed to reveal all - since secrecy is a key component of the
occupational culture, police are unlikely to reveal all so comprehensive revelation seem unlikely -
and the possibility of the researcher's inability to comprehend processes not directly obsenred. Thus,
the degree of specificity of this approach was minimized by using a combination of methods
including personal interviews, made complementary to each other for affecting greater empirical
validity to the study.
The data collected from all the four thanas and their jurisdictional area of a district in Orissa,
employing the same set of research strategies, were meaningfully analysed by linking the data
together in a plausible and relevant manner. The analytical approach consisted of perusing the data
relevant to particular identified practices, proposing a concrete idea structured around the question
over the relationship of the original theoretical concepts based on operating norms, then 'testing' the
idea by studying relevant case(s) collected from the field that includes drawing necessary
comparisons between the different police-stations, and reformulating the notion, if necessary, by
looking for distinctive differences and connections in the evaluation of situational rules and other
considerations that explain the said prevalent practice. In short, the policework practices were
interrogated by identifYing and interpreting the relationship between the determinants that connect
up to explain the actual established processes of the derailed reality of daily police operations.
Ethical Issues:
The question of ethics and ethical issues certainly arise (before and after) from the kind of problem a
researcher investigates and the methods used to obtain crucial, valid and reliable data. The ethical
dilemma is the conflict between the right to conduct research and right of research participants' to
self-determination, privacy and dignity. There are no absolute right or wrong answers to the ethical
issues, pertaining to the right of the researcher and that of the researched as the former's interest may
not only interfere with the rights and welfare of the latter, but that it may be breached by the latter's
unwillingness to cooperate with the research. Most research on police studies, show greater concern
and priority for ethics towards the police, understandably so, but the basic reason for such claims on
rights is self-serving. This study has taken into consideration the ethical issues concerning the
research participants, the police as well as the 'publics', based on three identified dimensions of
74 Roger Grimshaw and Tony Jefferson, Interpreting Policework: Policy and Practice in Forms of Beat Policing, Allen & Unwin, London, 1987, p. 33.
19
privacy, that is, the consequences or implications of the sensitivity of the information being
collected, the setting being observed, and the dissemination of information.
The method employed to collect a particular type of data is undeniably dependent on the
trust and confidence of the source of that information on the researcher. The method may not
necessarily be restricted to field research but includes survey research and documentary research as
well. The face-to-face interaction with the 'publics' during personal interviews was not a smooth,
easy-going affair given the nature of relationship between the police and the public. The most
critical of the tasks was participant observation where the researcher attempted to establish close
relationship with the members of the occupational group that significantly contributed to the
research agenda. So were the 'publics' that suspect anything related to the police and thus reluctant
to share information until convinced of the purpose.
The most serous ethical issue was, therefore, the responsibility of the researcher to uphold
the rights and welfare of the participants of this research project by protecting the anonymity of the
participants and keep the confidentiality of the data. It thus required the researcher to state the
nature and purpose of the study to acquire the informed consent of the participants. Albert Reiss
had used deception to gain access to observation on how police treated citizens. It raised ethical
questions as normatively it is the obligation of the researcher to carefully balance the potential
benefits or contribution of the project against its possible costs to the individual research participants
at every stage of the research process. It is often difficult and Reiss gave priority to the former at the
cost of the latter that invited serious criticism.75 During the course of this research on poLicework in
India, an area which has not been studied systematically, the researcher only on certain occasions to
overcome the impediments at critical stage of the research had to withhold information on the true
purpose of this study from the participants.
However, for this study the informed consent of the participants was felt essential on the
following considerations: (i) without it the researcher could not have gained access to strategic sites
of policework nor could have been accepted as a participant-observer; (ii) the researcher as
participant-observer was equally exposed to the risks and dangers in the working environment of the
police; and (iii) the most important was that a research of this kind would expose the participants to
unknown risks. But the dilemma of the researcher was how much information needed to be
disclosed or provided to the participants for obtaining permission. Another noticeable problem was
the difficulty on part of the participants to comprehend the research activity and its agenda.
Therefore, it was difficult to ensure informed consent in an absolute sense.
Hence, utmost care was taken to safeguard the welfare of the research participants. To that
effect, complete anonymity and confidentiality has been maintained by using fictitious names and
references, and blurring of those identifying facts that do not influence the general points being
made. This was done to underscore the objective and significance of this study and the underlying
assumption was that it was not interested in the individual behaviour but in their conduct as it
represented characteristic behavioural or attitudinal pattern of the police institution in certain
circumstances. It may be that certain responses of the people or events at places reported in this work
may find enthusiasm in some zealous readers to try identifying the same in actuality. The researcher
could only express his concerns for any possible negative effects on the participants because of this
work.
75 Chava Frankfort-Nachmias and David Nachmias, op. cit., pp. 79-80.
20
Ethical questions did arise over the effect of the researcher's presence on the publics' fate
during their encounter with the police. The researcher was circumspect in its conduct as a
participant-observer as to not allow itself to influence or alter the normal process of policework as it
would have taken place in his absence. The common element in any situation of contact with the
police is that the citizens seek for something that would aid their cause. In certain situations, the
roles of the participant-observer were partially effectual, for instance: (i) An indigent woman victim
of domestic violence appeared at a thana to seek police assistance but the police refused to oblige
unless she furnished a written complaint to that effect. Though it may appear at first as an attempt
to get rid of the women, one could empathise with the police rationale for their unwillingness to
reduce the victim's oral complaint to writing that there lies the possibility of the police being accused
of misrepresentation of facts. The observer without the knowledge of the police facilitated in making
the complaint available to the victim that compelled the police to respond; (ii) A complainant, well
known to the observer, had sought police intervention in a case of conflict with its tenant. Seeing the
observer, the complainant made it obvious to the dealing officer of its acquaintance with him.
Sooner, the solution proposed by the police appeared favourable to the complainant and both parties
agreed to honour it.
The ethical line in such circumstances is hard to place but the researcher was quite conscious
of observing the rule that its role as a participant-observer be inconsequential to the normal process _
of police operations. Particularly concerned, care was also taken that the observer's presence either ~2~ did not adversely affect the public's lawful rights or have had any legal consequences for the public. 1' ':.'::/-· :-~..,
ff.c:: J ("' i/ Cl \ ~::· Universe of Study: ~:z. \ :C: The data for this work were drawn from an empirical study of four police-stations and their~~:·~:~: j operational areas conducted by the researcher in a district of Orissa, a province in eastern India. The '<""~ name of the district is withheld in effect to the maximum restrain shown to protect the rights' and
welfare of the research participants and the confidentiality of the data that was used for this study.
The police in India are operationally organised on the basis of districts and the quotidian
level operations take place at the police-station, that are variously known as 'thana', 'kotwalt, etc. 76
The rest of the structures above it are supervisory in nature. Orissa is divided into eight ranges with a
total of 34 police districts, 35 sub-divisions, 91 circles and a total of 465 police-stations (291 rural
police-stations, 168 urban police-stations and 6 women police-stations).77
The number of police-stations chosen for this research work was m an attempt to
proportionately represent the number of existing nature of police-stations in the district so as to
obtain a comprehensive view of the police administration in Orissa viz. rural, urban and semi-urban.
76 Hereon, both the terms, 'police-station' and 'thana' will be used interchangeably. 77 It is pertinent to note the ostensible discrepancies in the Orissa figures on the police organisational setup that have been
provided in Crime in India only since the report of 1999. The figures on all given indicators remained constant during the years 1999 and 2000 i.e. 7 ranges, 34 police districts, 35 sub-divisions, 90 circles, 300 rural police-stations, 149 urban police-stations and 4 women police-stations. According to Crime in India-2001, there was a large rearrangement in the organisational setup during 2001. In just one year period, there were 8 newly created sub-divisions, 20 rural police-stations that were either shut down or ceased its rural status, 18 urban police-stations that were either newly created or granted the said recognition, and 3 more women police-stations were formed. According to the latest Crime in India report of 2002, in the same year, there was an addition each in the number of ranges, and circles, the number of sub-divisions was restored to the status as reported during the year 2000, one rural police-station and 11 urban police-stations were added to the respective totals of the previous year, and one less in the number of woman policestations over the previous year's tally. See Crime in India- 1999, National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA), Government of India (GO I), New Delhi, 2001, Table 98, p. 422; Crime in India- 2000, NCRB, MHA, GOI, New Delhi, 2002, Table 98, p. 414; Crime in India- 2001, NCRB, MHA, GOI, New Delhi, 2003, Table 98, p. 568; Crime in India- 2002, NCRB, MHA, GOI, New Delhi, 2004, Table 17.11, p. 590.
21
The four thanas selected for study are two rural, one urban and one semi-urban that has within its
jurisdiction a Notified Area Council. The semi-urban police-station is more rural than urban.
Fictitious names are given to the police-stations for obvious reasons as stated before hence it
could only be possible to provide only a restricted general overview, withholding accurate
descriptions of these places. The police-stations are thus named as Lekhpur, Sewaknagar,
Y eshodabad and Birjodi.
Lekhpur and Birjodi are contiguous rural areas that have a small central place where
important government institutions are located in regard to civil administration, provision for health
services, postal and telecommunication services, and above all the police-station, the focus of this
study. Local traders conduct their business in a market place in this area. The jurisdiction of both
these police-stations are approximately the same i.e. 200 sq. kms. While the latter has approx. 200
villages and 35 Gram Panchayats, the former has nearly 130 villages and 25 Gram Panchayats. There
are pockets of Muslim population in both the region with the latter having a relatively substantial
proportion, both have a similar but impressive male-female ratio of nearly equal proportions, and
the average percentage of the population of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes are approx. 20
and negligible, respectively. The mainstay of the economy of these regions that most preoccupy the
people is agriculture and agro-based activities.
Yeshodabad is semi-urban in character with nearly 3.5 percent of its total area recognised as
Notified Area Council that has a population of nearly 15,000, a larger concentration of SC
population as against their total percentage in the entire thana area, a developed town-like area that
houses the office of the Sub-Divisional Judicial Magistrate in addition to other general government
offices, hospital, schools and colleges, a huge market area, central bus-stand, besides the thana and
also the office of the Sub-Divisional Police Officer. The geographical area of this police-station is the
largest of all the four thanas that are studied, nearly 300 sq. kms. It has around 130 revenue villages
with little more than 15 Gram Panchayats. Its total population of more than a lakh, is the least of
the three rural thanas, with equally lesser percentage of SC population but far greater percentage of
ST population than others. It has a marginal Muslim population. The male-female ratio quite
approximates to the other two thana areas. The workforce in all the rural thana areas is
predominantly male, the largest obviously being in Yeshodabad which also has the largest female
workers, a little more than that of Lekhpur. Birjodi though being the most highly populated and
with the highest female population apart from the city of the district, it has one of the lowest female
workforce comprising nearly seven percent of the whole. The economic profile is no distinctly
different from the other two. 78
Sewaknagar police-station falls under the city area of the district. It is the smallest (area-wise)
of all the four thanas and the difference from the rest is phenomenal. Its jurisdictional area is approx.
15 sq. kms., which is only 7 percent of the average jurisdictional area of the rural thanas under study.
However, it has a well-developed urban character with the usual patches of slums in its fringes. The
workforce is huge, in varied trades and services. It has nearly three distinctive minority colonies and
certain caste-specific settlements inhabited by the marginalised
Lekhpur, Birjodi, and Yeshodabad are located towards the northeast, northwest, and west of
the district police headquarters, approximately at an average distance of 50 kms from it, while
Sewaknagar is understandably within the urban expanse of the district.
78 Based on the District Statistical Handbook, Directorate of Economics and Statistics, Government of Orissa, Bhubaneswar, 1999.
22
lhese pohce-stanons are conventionally nausea m smatt, auap10area suuuurc:s, I<t.I.!Uut; c:v~;;u
the most basic requirements from the operational point of view. Generally, there are just two rooms
in every police-station. While effectively the entire station unit operates from just one cramped
room, the other is exclusively for the in-charge of the thana who enjoys an independent workspace.
At times when a warrantee is arrested, the operational space for the staff recedes. It is because as in
some of the thanas there are no lockups, they are bound to the legs of one of the officer's table.
Again for lack of space, the constables would most often be found wandering around the vicinity of
the police-station, at the nearest paan shop as in Lekhpur.
The study also incorporated within its purview the working of the subordinate posts of the
police-stations, such as outpost, beat house and aid-post, wherever there was any. A notable feature
of these police-stations, save one for being a rented accommodation, is the existence of a small
Hindu religious structure within its premises. Though it may not appear strange to lay persons, but
despite opposition from the locals the overzealous in-charge of one of the thanas under study went
ahead constructing a temple adjacent to the thana, directly opposite the very popular ancient temple
of the local god. Yet in another case, in one of the city police-stations, a huge temple was built
within its premises under the aegis of the Inspector in-charge who along with his wife inaugurated it
with great pomp.79
These thanas were selected to examme the vanance m the organisational character and
functional styles of the rural and urban police and their working environment. Further, the focus on
a single district was to look at policework as practiced at different police-stations under the same
administrative supervision of a Superintendent of Police. The identification of the particular thanas
was based on the consideration that it would be possible to grasp the unity of organised policework
in all its significant diversity and complexity. In this regard, the suggestions of a known experienced
police practitioner in the district were valuable. The critical assistance of known resource persons to
gainfully aid in the research work was also found in these areas.
Thus, the four identified thanas and the public residing under their respective jurisdictions
objectively constituted the universe of this study.
A Profile of the Thanas:
The profiles of the police-stations being studied are based on latest official records (notes/reports)
and observation:
SEWAKNAGAR:
The discrepancy between the sanctioned and present strength was found only in the rank of
the constables. The strength of the police-station including that of its subordinate posts was 39 as
against the sanctioned strength of 47, the shortfall was in the rank of constables.
The police-station is housed in an old dilapidated rented building with no basic
infrastructural facilities, mandatory for an operable unit viz., lock-up, malkhana, etc. Its subordinate
posts are well-equipped as they were recently constructed. There has been a constant change in the
physical character of the area, an urban phenomenon, which makes it incumbent upon the police to
constantly keep itself abreast of such alterations as it is consequential to policing affairs.
79 To a more curious question by the researcher on how the sight of such structures within the precincts of a sensitive state organisation augur well for its image in a plural society, the police officer on probation retorted, "it is a Hindu nation as majority are Hindus". For such activities, resources are generally unscrupulously mobilised. It was learnt that a former in-charge of one of these four thanas had also mobilised resources in a like manner only to erect a permanem structure for the purpose of station work.
23
BIRJODI:
This thana reflects a phenomenon of continuity and commonality in administrative
practices in India. The size of the jurisdiction of this police-station appears to be no different from
what existed in the 1960s in West Bengal or Rajasthan when David H. Bayley, a police scientist,
undertook a study on India. 80 There is lack of motorable roads in this region and many of the
inhabited villages remain inaccessible.
The thana highlights the queered official rationale underpinning the police policy in the
state as far as the strength of the rural police-stations is concerned. The standing strength of this
thana was incredibly low at eleven as against not so significantly sanctioned strength of 15, the
discrepancy once again visible at the constable level. Its outpost had a negligible strength of five. The
effect of 'manpower' of this size with inadequate infrastructural facilities, like communication and
transport, 81 on the organisation's operational efficiency that is responsible for a mammoth
jurisdictional area has been discussed later in this study by linking and connecting up these
determinants while analysing policework.
YESHODABAD:
It no longer sounds unusual but administratively still obfuscatory that Yeshodabad has far
larger jurisdictional area than Birjodi. The standing strength of this thana quite fulfills its sanction,
the same as provided for Birjodi. It has no ancillary posts.
LEKHPUR:
It becomes all the more convincing now that the state has a uniform police policy regarding
manpower resources designated for rural thanas, irrespective of their geographic or demographic
character. Moreover, the sanctioned strength deficient in itself is hardly ever actualised.
Though, the average jurisdiction of this thana approximates to that of Birjodi, its sanctioned
strength of 15 is what Yeshodabad with far larger operational area is supposed to make do with the
same constant. Rather interestingly, the composite strength of the Birjodi thana and its subordinate
post is similar to that of Lekhpur although the subordinate post of the latter has a different status
than one existing under Birjodi. All the three kinds of posts i.e. beat house, outpost, and aid-post
have different configura! characteristics owing to their raison d' etre.
Three of these four police-stations share a common police system in terms of the existence of
an auxiliary group called the village police that are essentially watchmen, variously known as chowkia
or gram rakhi.
Sample:
Functionaries of these four thanas and the public residing under their respective jurisdictions
comprised of two distinct population of the universe from which sampling units for constituting two
sets of sample, one comprising of the police and the other that of the public, were methodically
selected for this study.
The researcher adopted the 'probability sampling technique' to select a sizeable number of
sampling units from all the jurisdictions of the four thanas to form four different samples that could
be sufficiently representative of their respective jurisdictions. Such a construct that determined the
character of the sample is dictated by the assumption that police is the most visible embodiment of
the state and as it affects the daily lives of the people, the social context too impinges on police
80 David H. Bayley, op. cit, pp. 78-79. 81 The latest Inspection Reports on the thana also records these inadequacies.
24
activity. In view of the objective of the survey, for a plural society, the relevant method employed
was 'stratified random sampling'.
The other subset of a sampling frame of too finite a population of thana personnel was also
to be selected on the basis of 'stratified sampling' using ranks as the parameter. Due to the inevitable
problem of limitation of the researcher having neither control nor alternative or choice over the
selection of the sample from a small sampling frame of an average population of twenty who are
subject to the rigours of work by the statutory requirement of being "considered to be always on
duty" and other factors82 that the researcher could manage to personally interview only a few police
personnel that would thus constitute a convenience sample. In addition, the information gathered
from indiscriminate interactions with the personnel during the researcher's role as participant
observer have to a considerable extent served the same purpose of a personal interview.
'Purposive sampling' was employed to select the relevant FIRs registered at the four thanas
and also the reports of incidents/events that were reflected in the Station Diaries (SDs) of these
thanas during the year 2000. As a result, the 'publics' (complainants, victims, accused, witnesses, and
the concerned others) of the selected FIRs and SD entries constituted a fourth sample besides the
aforesaid ones.
Such a comprehensive sampling strategy was suitably designed to examme the research
questions thoroughly as possible to produce valid empirical generalisations.
CONCLUSION
The stated concern of this study was to determine the set of police functions and the processes of
policework in actual practice. Subsequently, it also looks at the way police activities impinge on its
operational setting and how does its constituents by their nature of the contacting role set off a
process of reciprocal relationship.
In order to pursue this agenda, necessary empirical data was obtained on policework and the
relations of the police with the public over a period of time by employing a triangulation of
methods. The data on the contemporary situation that constitute of the history of the present were
analysed with that of its past for the irrefragable continuities in structural determinants.
The first chapter deals on the issue of the context in which the police is organised in the
state system and an outline of this institution as it has evolved in India. A description of the physical
setting in which the police operates at the quotidian level forms the next chapter. Chapter three
attempts to examine the idea of police in a democracy and deals with a general theoretical
understanding of organised policework that informs the importance of various notions like structural
and cultural elements and contexts, and their mutual effect on police practices. This could offer an
adequate explanatory framework to examine the profane details of daily police operations.
The following chapters explore the processes of specific forms of policework, that is,
reporting, investigation work, and preventive policing and public order policing, respectively. The
task involves analysis of the work processes in terms of the procedural specificities and as it prevails
in actual practice. The penultimate chapter discusses the police activities as they affect the public and
examines the relations between the two primarily by the results of the survey data of the responses of
82 The researcher was conscious of the faet that the traits of secrecy and suspicion of the occupational culture may inhibit the process of eliciting information through organised personal interviews. Hence, it was always only towards the end of the field work that the researcher initiated the process of administering the interview schedules. To a certain extent, quite true to the researcher's fear, some officers either lacked interest or were reluctant to go through the interview. Therefore, the researcher had to make a deliberate attempt to maximise the opportunities from the possible interviews with the most experienced hands. The constables were exemplary as respondents as they had no inhibition towards interviews and, moreover, both forthcoming and forthright in their responses.
25
both the police and the public on policing issues. The last chapter deals on the recent paradigm
shifts in policing strategies, especially the concept of community-policing.
In conclusion, the researcher summarises the entire work, examines the interrelated
hypotheses and offers valid generalisations with its reflections on the subject of enquiry.
26