CLEANING UP ACT

Union home minister P Chidambaram has, in his admonishment of the Mumbai police, pointed to a very unfortunate trend which has developed lately -- senior police officers using the media to score points off each other. The run up to the first anniversary of the November 26 terror attacks saw a most unseemly series of controversies erupting, where police officers accused each other of dereliction or shirking of duty, cowardice, deliberate withholding of information and so on. Even worse, this was played out in public.

 

Adding to this internal battle was the publication of two books connected with the attacks. One, by a former police officer, accused serving officers of deliberating conspiring against another. The second, by the wife of one of the officers felled in the 26/11 battle, raises questions about the role played by a colleague in her husband's death.

 

The issue is not just about whether all these accusations and suspicions are true or not. It is about the apparent lack of trust, fellowship and professionalism within what was once the most envied police force in the country. The public was in any case quite appalled at the fumblings of the Mumbai police during the terror attacks. Now it seems that all those fears were true -- the Mumbai police did not work as one force. Instead it has exposed itself as faction-ridden, self-serving and corrupt. This is not corruption connected with money so much as a fall in ethics and discipline. We have just been through the ugly spectacle offour senior most policemen in Maharashtra rushing to court over who best deserves the post of Director general of police.

 

It is no secret that political interference in the police and bureaucracy has been a curse for this country. This ugly fact reared its head in Mumbai some 20 years ago, according to experts. The way out, also according to experts, is to finally enact all those police reforms which have been waiting to unshackle the Indian Police Service from the colonial vice it operates under.