What ails the police?

by Pradnya Saravade and Renuka Sane.





The recent incidents of rape in Delhi have led to public outrage and calls for resignation of the Delhi Police Commissioner. The problems in police functioning and the unmet expectations of the people are not restricted to Delhi alone. There is a sense of distrust and dissatisfaction with police organisation and operations across the country. In a survey by Transparency International and the Centre for Media Studies, the police topped the list on both perception of corruption and actual experience with corruption. The challenge of police reforms looms large, and an inadequate response may prove to be very costly to not just economic growth, but overall social stability of the country.





It is important to think of three aspects of police operations:

• Manpower
  
  


• Competence
  
  


• Accountability

Manpower

The number of policemen per 100,000 people in India in 2011 was 137. This compares to about 217 in Australia, 393 in Hong Kong, 370 in Malaysia, 195 in South Korea, 307 in the UK and 256 in the USA.



The overall average masks remarkable variation within states in India. The first column (1) in the Table below on the four most populous states from the four regions in India sourced from the National Crime Records Bureau, shows that Bihar and Uttar Pradesh have only 65 and 94 policemen per 100,000 population, a very low number even by Indian standards. These statistics reflect a very low presence of police personnel on the streets and consequently a high work-load on those on duty.

	(1)	(2)
State	Per 100,000 population (2011)	Police expenditure (% of total expenditure) (2012-13)
Uttar Pradesh	94	5.2
Bihar	65	4.5
Maharashtra	163	4.8
Andhra Pradesh	106	3.1

Competence

The State may increase recruitment into the police force over the next few years. For policing to be effective, however, the policemen need to be competent to serve the population on local crimes: from murder and rape to kidnapping and burglary, handling mass agitations of an aggrieved public against the State in a sensitive manner, and also getting into action during terrorist strikes utilising a completely different skill set. The increasing demands on all of the above require that the police undergo continuous training and upgradation of skills, and be well equipped with the latest technology and weaponry.

It is, then, not just a matter of hiring more policemen but also a matter of devoting top management time to organising the police force well, and ensuring adequate inputs of equipment and training.



The second column (2) in the Table above, sourced from States of India, CMIE, shows that the expenditure on police in the four states is about 3-5% of total expenditure.

A large part of this expenditure is on the maintenance of the existing police machinery. There is little scope for the police to invest in training and upgradation of skills. This expenditure on policing is not enough to even cater to the basic needs of staff and equipment.

Accountability

The efficiency with which spending is converted into public goods outcomes depends on accountability mechanisms. Ultimately, the test of the effectiveness of the increase in police strength and expenditures is the resolution of crime, and satisfaction of the public on the service provided by the police machinery. There has been dissatisfaction on the evaluation system of police organisations, and a Supreme Court judgement required the setting up of state security commissions in every state. One of the mandates of these commissions is to develop a framework that measures performance through crime victimisation and police perception surveys. As yet, no state has done this. There was one randomised experiment which included a crime victimisation survey in Rajasthan. However, it has not been institutionalised as part of police policy to be followed up at regular intervals. Unless a well conceived survey based feedback loop is established, and becomes a periodic feature of the policy on policing, accountability on the desired outcomes cannot really be expected.

Conclusion

The personal safety of citizens is a public good. It satisfies the two tests for a public good: it is non-rival (your consumption of safety does not diminish my safety) and non-excludable (we cannot exclude a new born child from the blanket of safety).



The desire for safety is the most basic human impulse. To some extent, sectarian impulses amongst common people in India may be driven by the unmet requirement for safety in individuals who then resort to embracing kith and kin in the quest for safety. Without safety, the project of building prosperity through a market economy will stall, as the operations of complex firms break down when faced with criminality and the threat of expropriation dulls the incentive to work.



The republic needs to do more in terms of building a world class criminal justice system, and achieving safety for all. This requires improvements in laws, courts and police. For the police, this requires getting more policemen, transforming their training, equipment and management, and establishing accountability mechanisms.