Can the police solve all our problems?

I wish I could upload his picture here; that would give away my identity wouldn't it? A bright-eyed, 24-year-old, well built, strong looking, well meaning, differently abled young man who runs a small shop in a small town in a small state in this country. And he is always around for the cops in the station. For me too, and any other senior officer who visits the station.

In fact, if there is any incident in the town, you can be rest assured you'll find him close at hand, looking out for us for it is not something unheard of that the crowd suddenly turns violent against the police. He will be standing close by, in his clean shirt and trousers, sleeves rolled up to show his muscles, nodding, smiling and watching the crowd, all five feet three inches of him. He brings back faith in humanity to the cold, hard-hearted policemen here.

I have never seen or met anyone like this before in all my years of service. I'm sure in some other corner there is a man like this helping the police. He expresses with his nods and smiles. He reassures us all. Even though he cannot hear or speak, his eyes gleam with warmth.

I wonder what exactly is safety and security. Is it the police which keeps the society secure or is it the society which provides for security on its own. Such amazing volunteers exist in our cities and towns: the ones who worked tirelessly in Chennai or Kashmir, the ones who follow traffic rules, the ones who donate to charity, the ones who lower the volume when they host a party, the ones who do not litter and so on. Social and psychological security is required as much in a society as is physical security. While physical security is visible and tangible (who can miss the gun toting, equipment laden cops at possibly every street corner), that it leads to social and psychological security is debatable.

In some situations, I think long-term exposure to visible forms of security like the police and armed forces actually makes a society more insecure and cripples it. The entire community loses its ability to fight back. It genuinely believes that it is the problem of the police to solve all issues starting from insurgency to relief during an earthquake. We, the police, are equally a part of the society. When a town is flooded, or when an earthquake demolishes a city our police stations and homes are not spared.

We will come forward and work towards rescuing the community, along with anyone who wants to help. I guess it would sound utopian to imagine a self-regulating society. In fact that may have been the aspiration of the social contract theory. When did it become an "us versus them" scenario?

Inside our own organisation though, there are still some hard-hitting questions to ask. Have all the goals been met? Policing is a fluid situation; new cases every day, new challenges, but mostly the same personnel! Is it the bullet or the finger on the trigger? Is it akin to asking the chicken/egg question? There has never been a worse time than this to don khaki.

The brass is polished, the stars are shined, pleats are aligned as the officer walks in to his office, but for the 88 per cent constabulary nothing much has changed. The constable still does not have a place to sit in the police station.

In states that are worse off in terms of infrastructure he often does not have place to sleep where the ceiling does not leak during rainy days. It is worse if you are a lady constable; a temporary barrier is the only shield to save your modesty as you brush your teeth or go for a bath.

The question is, who has failed? The answer is we all have. The officer who had to sanction the financial budget, the person who had to convince that the police budget is indeed essential, the politician who thinks distributing laptops converts to votes better than giving cops a decent barrack, the person who prepared the estimate and proposal, the officers who took the commission to clear the files, the officers who did not speak up, the persons who were sidelined, the persons who allowed themselves to be sidelined; the list is endless. The results are devastating to just the one person: the common man.

His road is blocked, he can't go to a shop, he can't use the highway, his vehicle is damaged, his case is not registered, he is lathi-charged without due process, he is at the mercy of organisations and he is also at the mercy of the government. He votes, but he has no control over his elected representative. He increases TRP but he has no control over the content. He is brutalised by terrorists and red tape in equal measure. Some day all of this has to blow.

And it will blow in the face of the administration. Suppression is not the key. The government has to open its eyes. If there is not a single tree and the land is encroached by farmlands and residential buildings, then de-notify the forest area. At least make a road, build a school, put a hospital: why alienate those people today. You should have not let them squat 20 years ago. Why put the onus of saving a forest on the police now, when you had a forest department all along?

There seems to be no answers and yet we are led to believe that we are secure.