Delhi Police (Amendment) Bill, 2010 reveals colonial mindset

If you are inebriated enough that you can not take care of yourself, you could be liable to pay a fine of Rs 1,000. If you bring a servant from your home town and you fail to submit him or her for police verification, the fine could be Rs 5,000. Delhi Police (Amendment) Bill 2010 (http://www.delhi.gov.in/), which has seen spirited opposition from leading citizen groups in the capital, who went all the way to the Union home minister, P. Chidambaram, and the home secretary, G. K. Pillai, is now open for public scrutiny on April 24, with the conference to be presided over by the chief minister, Sheila Dikshit, after the Lt. Governor Tejendra Khanna refused to do the honour, and would be attended by noted jurist, J. S Verma, police expert, Kamal Kumar, and a host of people drawn from all walks of life, including four journalists.

This legislative proposal, which will go to the Parliament, needs to be studied closely and enough voice need to be raised, as it has serious consequences for the citizens. At the outset, one can summarise this legislative proposal an attempt by the Delhi Police to garner as much power as it can in the name of improving effective policing. Absolute power corrupts absolutely and it applies very well on the Delhi Police, which is fat enough to have more than 60,000 cops on its roll.

There have been backgrounds for this legislative proposal in the form of Supreme Court directions, Nanavati Commission recommendations and reports of the Administrative Reforms Committee. Delhi Police (Amendment) Bill, 2010 does not conform to the above cited backgrounds and rather bares the mindset of the city police, which believes in just making laws for effective policing.

Against the provision of the CrPC, this bill says that no one can ask for report on arrests made by the police and also does away with the magisterial inspection of the arrests made. Further, the police commissioner or any member of the police (even a constable) can give a "verbal order, declaring riots situation, which will be notified in 24 hours". These two provisions are against the spirit of the freedom of the civic society and the concept of checks and balances and will have serious consequences.

Further, the new bill proposes to empower the police commissioner, being the head of the proposed Police Establishment Board for transfer and postings of junior officials, while for the seniors the proposal does away the concept of a three member screening committee, which includes the chief secretary, home secretary and a member from the police. While the first proposal leaves the scope of corruption in transfer and postings, which is reported to be the biggest source of money making by corrupts, the second does away with the civic society having any say in this matter.

All the earlier recommendations of excluding the non-core functions of the police have equally been ignored. Take for the instance, Delhi police has roughly 200 staff  designated for the work of issuing all kinds of licenses, which does not happen to be its core functions. Licensing in all the states is with the civic departments, which even in Delhi can be done that too with higher satisfaction for the citizens.

The preposterous proposals in this bill are regarding the fines, which have all been raised roughly by 10 to 50 times. All the fines would be in the range of Rs 1,000 to Rs 10,000. A jaywalker would be liable for a fine of Rs 1,000, while the same applies for those urinating in public and much more. The question here is whether a commoner keeps Rs 1,000 in his wallet all the times. As is the image of the police, this will lead the police to indulge in taking Rs 200 in place of Rs 1,000 to relieve the man from the charges of offending the law and would just add to the rampant corruption among the men in khakhi.

Delhi Police (Amendment) Bill, 2010 needs close scrutiny and is available on http://www.delhi.gov.in/ and people can leave their comments for Mr Vishvendra, Deputy Secretary of the Home department of the Delhi government. All the public comments will be compiled and will be sent to the Union home ministry along with the draft of the bill, so that the Central government can take a reasonable decision on this proposal. It's time to be informed citizens and become a part of the decision making process.

Save buffalo!!!

In few years buffalo might be extinct from India. Tough to swallow, as it sounds so! However, an hour long analysis by a credible official in the know of intelligence inputs, who keeps a tab on the scale of illegal slaughtering of the bovine animal in Delhi, drove hard the point that the buffalos are on their way to extinction. So far we know of "Save Tiger" campaign, but later on the campaign to save buffalo might be on the anvil, as it appears so.

If this sounds weired, then check out the scale of illegal slaughtering going on not only in Delhi but also in rest of the country. In Delhi alone, at least 10,000 buffalos are slaughtered a day, mostly for the purpose of export. Top meat exporters in the capital were given a presentation few months ago on how buffalos are on their way to become extinct. They were told India would soon become like the Arabian countries where there is no bovine animal, as men there ate them all during the course of time.

Also, the scale on which the people in the Arabian countries are eating the Indian bovine animals far outmatch their replenishments. Though there are laws forbidding the slaughter and keeping of meats of the agricultural cattles, read the buffalo, cows, etc, the greed for short money by the people in the authority are assisting in finishing off the animals quite freely.  

The might of those involved in the trade of illegal slaughetring is so high in the capital that despite a man giving all the proof in the form of CD, which had the photographs of his home soaked in the animal blood due to the illegal slaughtering in his neighbourhood, hardly any action followed.

Recently, after the BJP created much din  in the Delhi Assembly over the issue of whether the permission to serve beef would be allowed in the Games Village during the Commonwealth Games, the city government with much hesitation stated a day later that it would abide by the existing law, Delhi Agricultural Cattle Protection Act, which forbids slaughter as well as even keeping their meat in the National Capital Territory by any person. Though the Delhi government has not done anything to enforce the law, the BJP due to its ideological leaning is itself searching out for those in the trade to get them arrested.

A new legislation in the form of Delhi Police (Amendment) Bill, 2010 is empowering the police to take action against those involved in the trade of illegal slaughtering. Lets hope that the insatiable demand of those within and outside the country to eat the bovine animals fail and India in the coming generations live to see these peaceful creatures.     

India under siege

In a horrific act of violence the naxalites massacred about 75 security personnel in Dantewada in Chhatisgarh early morning today, with top officials suggesting that the victims walked into the trap. Dantewada has been one of the strongest den of the naxalites for few years and joint operations were being carried out in the area. The massacre is intolerable. This shows that India is very much at the doorsteps of a full blown war within its territory. The decision makers are now faced with the challenge to make choices between peaceful ways of bringing the warlords for talks or to accept the challenge and launch a no-holds-barred war with the insurgents. 

The naxal incidents in the recent years show that the internal security managers of the country need to correct their fundamentals. Their report card otherwise suggest that they should be drowned into the bay of Bengal. The governments both at the Centre and the states have compromised on internal security by not modernising the police forces nor made them professional. The police forces in the country still live in the old world of registering complaints with their shallow investigation. The political leadership has made the police units in the states spineless, which is demonstrated time and again. The Mumbai terror attacks had proved that the people in the country are at the mercy of their fate only.

The new Union home minister P Chidambaram has wasted much of the precious time in speculating over bringing the naxalites to the negotiating table. The elusive naxalite Kishenji appears to have succeeded in fooling the security managers.

The damning fact remains that the naxalites in the country are well entrenched in the fortified Red Corridor, which stretches from Nepal to deep down in the forest of Chhatisgarh. Reports suggest that they are armed with much sophisticated weapons and are highly trained. Worst is that they have a domian of their own and they appear to rule their territory.

The time for soft approach towards the naxalistes (Maoists) insurgents is now up. Now, the time has come to look at the way the Sri Lankans wiped out the LTTE insurgents in their country. The internal security managers must set a timeline to finish off the insurgents with no conditions attached. Time is running out for them. It's better to act in time than to wait for the fate to hand out its verdict.