PRECEPTS OF

POLICE ADMINISTRATION

The word ‘administration’ originates from the Latin administrare and

administratum, which would mean ‘to serve’ or to be an aid to. Administration in
its pristine form denotes service or aidance though in modern parlance it stands
for management or governance of affairs. Non obstante the metachrosis of the
word, administration even in its modern avatar is service and aidance in essence
though from managerial level. Administration even now is serving and aiding an
objective or commitment through suitable planning, organisation, supervision
and control mechanisms. It normally is a distinct field of activity while being a
part of the organisation en attendant and stands above the latter by holding
overall charge of the affairs. Administration manifests at diverse levels with its
lower strata rooted in higher levels of the organisation. In government
organisations, higher functions of administration are invested in government at
stratified levels while lower functions are burdened on higher levels of the
organisations. The heads of the organisations join hands with the secretaries of
the departments and higher authorities in the government to run the
organisations. It is also in the police. While the police organisation en semble is
responsible for policing, the police chief and his staff handle the levers of police
administration at lower levels while the home secretary in charge of police in
tandem with higher echelons of the government handles it at higher levels.
POLICE ADMINISTRATION
Administration, be it service or management, is immanent in organizational
operations of all levels. In police, elements of administration are inherent at all
supervisory levels beginning from head constables upwards. Police stations as
grass root policing units go away with a large slice of the police administration.
So are district police offices in districts and police commissionerate in big cities
with the unit headquarters as the apex body of police administration within the
organisation. The interim levels bridge the gaps in between. The springboard of
police administration within the organisation is the state police headquarters in
a state with all important decisions of policing and police administration

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emanating from there under the control, supervision and guidance of the
government in the form of home department and higher levels. The police chief
ab intra and home secretary and chief secretary in states ab extra form vital links
of police administration. The ethos and character of a police force are shaped
by these key figures of the police administration. Though political leadership is
there as policy makers and executive heads of both the organisation and the
government, it is these three configurations as innards of the setup, control and
guide the police by administrative controls, head and shoulder above political
heads.
A SPECIALISED FIELD
Administration as a service in spirit and governance in manifestation deals
with men, money, materials and machinery through the means of laws, rules,
decisions and directions. Of these, men form the most vital ingredient of
management and governance. This is especially so in organisations entirely
dependent on human resources to meet objectives and goals. Administration for
most part is human resources management in a manpower-oriented force like
the police. The special problems of the police setup, its distinct culture and service
conditions, the stress and strain of policing and the non a such psychological
factors unique for the organisation crop up issues unseen other where. This
renders police administration a specialized field to be handled by experts having
insight to and realization of the special nature of policing conditions and the
psychological pressures on policemen on the off duty in the organisation.
ISSUES IN POLICE ADMINISTRATION
The problems of police and policing are inveterate in the contradictions
immanent to the organisation, its status in society and the nature of job it
performs. The organisation is primly stratified with a serve hierarchical order and
stern discipline to the boot, preposterous to a free human nature. Police, perform
the unpleasant task of disciplining and using force against fellow citizens. The
unpopular job does not bode well to the psychological well-being and for
leading common life in a society that exoterically fears and esoterically hates them.
The police live in society in the ambience of sempiternal fear, suspicion and
hatred against them. There is no love lost between the two and no real mutual
respect. Such a living is not conducive to healthy mental fettle of human beings
what policemen are. Sine dubio, the status enjoyed by the police as enforcers of
the rule of law and the fear they inspire among the hoi polloi are some
compensations and solace for the malaise. The tragedy is that these apparent
benedictions themselves create problems of complex social adaptations to make
up for the imbalance caused by their real social status nowhere coming near the

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importance they enjoy in society as law-enforcers vi et armis. The embarrassment

is common to all ranks of the police. As constables of limited education, social
position and enlightenment, they are required in streets and police stations to
handle people of far higher social status and standing from a position of strength.
As senior-most police officers of premier investigation agency of the country,
they are required to investigate, arrest and charge sheet men of the standing of
the Prime Minister of the country and similarly placed high dignitaries. The
position is not as easy and joyous as it appears ab extra. The strains of such
responsibilities preposterous to human nature and natural human tendencies of
respect to social stations cause can only be imagined to be believed. Added to
it, the feeling of insecurity bred by the potentiality of wrath and revanche of highly
placed people pregnant in upright police actions further flummoxes the matter
for the mental peace of the police. It is easily said that policemen ought to
perform their duties en regle on merit. Images of policeman as a father shooting
to kill his fleeing criminal son, as a son arresting his erring father or as a brother
in pursuit of his criminal brother etc are mere fairy tales invented for films. The
fact is that a policeman cannot be a creature abstracted from his surroundings
and shut to natural human passions, emotions, feelings and familial attachments.
If did, he cannot be a human being, but a mere robot, a lifeless machine
performing police job. A policeman is a human being imprimis and the human
nature makes him a good policeman. He sans human nature and its sweet failings
cannot be real police stuff. He is not a mere robot to unwind in the blinkers of
professional duties and responsibilities. The police in field perforce perform as
robots against their natural human sensibilities and sensitivities on orders from
above to show results. This ingredient of policing has great impact on the
psychological makeup of the police. Added to this, the unending oppression and
fear of disciplinary actions from higher-ups for a wink of an eye common in
police makes the police life suffocating. It is said that policemen at all levels live
with a sword of danger algate dangling over their heads. Ruthlessness is a fact
of man management in police administration. Human relations here are slender
and easily snap under the weight of job-related surquedry. The biggest tragedy
of police life is the absence of human concerns around it. Endless interaction with
ruffians inside and outside the organisation deprives policemen their natural
sweetness and gentleness. There is no scope for inteneration of their mental
makeup. Police administration needs to take these special features of police life
and psyche into consideration in running the organisation. The need renders
police administration a specialized field.

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A BALANCING ACT
Responsibilities of any administration are two fold-providing the body and
shapes required to fulfill the objectives of the organisation within the limits of the
extant laws and providing right ambience to boost the morale, motivation and
above all, the mental well-being of the manpower of the organisation. The extra-
ordinary nature of the organisation of the police and its working conditions
render the latter responsibility a sensitive field warranting specialized study and
application. The complex psychological factors involving policing in diverse
social conditions and social imperatives of a policeman’s life perforce require
dexterous handling of affairs to promote high morale and right motivation in
the place of present crass rule-of-thumb approach common to Indian police.
What is required is a highly intricate organizational policy imbued with specialized
skills and insight of the highest order to human nature to inspire, motivate and
get most out of the manpower at disposal. This involves balancing in police many
contradictions inherent to human psyche. In one hand, the police force has to be
steeped in professional pride, while on the other hand, taught to accommodate
in its character, the need of perfect obedience to the verge of servilities in a stiff
hierarchical order. It has to be tuned to be loyal to authority while its ultimate
loyalty must go to its professional objectives and the rule of law. The police have
to be tough and fearsome to criminals and law-breakers while it has to be gentle
and friendly to the plebeian. They have to be led to be law-abiding model citizens
while day and night deal with hardened criminals requires breaking the latter to
submission. While they are attuned to the interplay of ranks and status in the stiff
hierarchical order of the force, they have to be compelled to treat all as equals
and exercise authority even on the people at highest levels in society while
performing duties. The list goes on endlessly. The cardinal task of balancing these
contradictions in police is the real challenge of the police administration.
FIELD SITUATION
While police administration is a highly specialized field requiring extra-
ordinary skills the present police administration in India is archaic at best and
maladministration at worst. Actually there is no administration worth the name
save some mechanical motions and unintelligent convulsions to provide body
and shape to the organisation as time-to-time responses to day-to-day
challenges. No long term plans. No organizational initiatives. No growth and
coordination studies. The organisation takes care of itself depending upon need
factors. The maximum, police administration in India does is controlling
initiatives and works o of the police by throwing hurdles to prove existence. As

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far as morale, motivation and mental well-being of the manpower are

concerned, the contribution of Indian police administration is absolutely nil.
Police administrators believe that they have no role to play in the morale and
motivation of the police organisation. Threats and suppression is the staple of
manpower management in police. Wastage of human resources and man-days
is the general rule. Quality, efficiency and character are inconsequential.
Assessments are misnomers. Personal behoofs are the centers of all decisions.
Accommodating the desires of higher-ups in official and political circles and the
powerful people in consideration for quid pro quo is the accepted norm of Indian
police administration.
A CUSHY JOB
Police administration provides good covers to meet long cherished desires
and therefore considered as a cushy job. A police administrator can avail for
himself from the police organisation all behoofs inherent to police job like best
available transport and communication facilities and orderly services at will. The
police network throughout the country would be at his personal service
wherever and in whatever way he desires it. This is an invaluable asset for him
and his kith and kin. In the name of various studies concerning police, he can visit
foreign countries at his will and convenience at government expenditure.
Recently, a regional edition of a leading national English newspaper raised a hue
and cry on its front page for several days followed by a flood of letters to the
editor against a visit of the home secretary of the state with a huge contingent of
inconsequential police officials to a few western countries, supposedly to study
crime and traffic problems. The newspaper called the intentions of the study
apocryphal, the study gratuitous and the foreign tour during the holiday season
of those countries without first obtaining the assurance of cooperation of the
host countries in the study venture as outrageous and cried for stopping what is
called a pleasure trip. Its hullabaloo proved infructuous and the contingent
completed the tour malgre tout. When the home secretary visited foreign countries
again after six weeks for the same purpose, the national newspaper did not dare
to make an issue encore.
WRECKER OF PRIDE AND GOOD IMAGE
The basic needs of police and policing are professional pride and a good
image. These are the breath of policing and oxygen for the lungs of the police
organisation. They refresh the organisation, its system and personnel after
backbreaking and dangerous policing above the oppressive life-style in the police
ambience. They infuse entrain to the organisation, its system and the men to take
on gauntlets in wait and attend to with commitment and efficiency. Pride is the

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fuel of policing. Good image is the air that sustains the fire or the zeal of the
policing. Who are not aggraced by appreciation? Police force is capable of doing
its duties and carrying out its responsibilities with devotion and self-sacrifice; it
only wants sacrifices and devotion to work natural to it are appreciated. A good
image boosts its professional pride and adds to its sense of belonging. What else
the society can pay to the police for its self-sacrificing devotion to the well-being
of the society? The professional pride and the sense of belonging to an
organisation widely respected and appreciated by the public spur the police to
do better and better every time. The pride adds to its high morale, which is sine
qua non for good policing and healthy discipline in any police organisation.
Good image entails public cooperation and enhances the social recognition of
the police personnel. True policing is nonpossumus in the absence of the strength
of pride about work while discharging responsibilities to the society from a
position of strength. A weakened police organisation and its personnel put to
aidos can do no good policing. Pride is the root of morale. Commercial
enterprises know the fact and use the knowledge best to derive maximum out
of their human resources. Pride and high morale play decisive role in deciding
the quality and efficiency of work and discipline in the organisation. Its
importance naturally is very high in manpower-oriented organisations like the
police, particularly those that have to deal with the public from a position of
strength. Police personnel shamed and humiliated in their career can never face
the public from strength and do good policing. The tragedy lies in police
administration. Its vanity belittles the police, breaches its pride, shatters its self-
image and destroys its good public image by scrupleless and selfish interferences
in police affairs. Indian police administrators are too unenlightened to realize this
basic psychological imperative of good policing. The irony lies in that, that they
crassly indulge in exactly the opposite, that is crushing the professional pride
wherever it is traced raising its majestic head in the police. Sadly to meet personal
ends. Perhaps men in no other government departments suffer humiliations for
humiliation’s sake as in police. This is true of all levels including the higher ranks
in police. Suspensions and disciplinary actions are a common phenomenon in
Indian police. When no grounds selon les regles are available for disciplinary
proceedings, resorting to unfair and indecent measures like withdrawing
vehicles, telephones and other facilities, denying promotions, transfer to
humiliating jobs created for meeting such eventualities, keeping on prolonged
compulsory waiting without a job etc are the common scenario to face even by
very senior level officers in Indian police. These humiliations weaken their
position before the public as well as subordinates whom they are supposed to

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control and guide with the strength of their leadership qualities. What leadership
one can have while he himself is wronged and humiliated from above for no
apparent reason? This is the atmosphere in which Indian police, police the crime
world. The consequence is a weak and confused police force with low self-
image, low morale, low motivation and servile complexes sans confidence and
public approbation.
ARROGANCE OF POWER
A factor responsible for maladministration becoming the abracadabra of
police administration is arrogance of power. The police is the real power, the
crux of the state power; the enforcer vi et armis on the field, not on papers as most
other government agencies are. Police administrators wield power on the
enforcers of the state power. Ergo, police administrators enjoy the temulence of
holding the ultimate power. Power breeds arrogance; ultimate power, ultimate
arrogance. This is the source of the arrogance of the police administration. The
sweep of arrogance is so strong that it has no patience to rules, laws, codes of
conduct, moral values, natural courtesies and human dignities. The only goal of
the police administration in the ambience of arrogance is proving its invincibility
a tout prix. Neither the well-being of the police administration nor the upkeep
of laws of the country has any say in choosing the means to achieve this end. Police
administrators going hors la loi for this vain goal is the rule in the country. A recent
example is a senior police officer in a state who insisted for suspension or transfer
of a subordinate after a criminal case of forgery, cheating, falsification of records,
breach of trust etc involving misappropriation of about Rs.36 lakhs during
discharge of official duties was registered against the subordinate in the police
station by his department. The latter’s good connections in the higher rungs of
administration prevented any further disciplinary actions imperative in such
circumstances. The insistence of the senior officer in writing for departmental
procedures against the subordinate inconvenienced the administration. The
insistence of the senior officer in writing for departmental procedures against the
subordinate inconvenienced the administration. The thinking of the
administration was that, that how a police officer at whatever rank can insist
disciplinary action when it has decided against it for whatever reasons. It decided
that the recalcitrant senior police officer had to be brought around and taught
to conform to its decisions, by legal or illegal means. The machinery of
administration ground is so hard that the senior police officer found continuing
in his position practically unbearable and impossible. He went on indefinite leave,
rather forced to do so. His harassment was so acute that at one juncture, he
addressed the head of the government, doubting the mental well-being of the

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perpetrators of the harassment and requested to save the department from the
prise of psychopathic tendencies of the concerned. The Chief Secretary of the
government after hearing him in August 1996, issued instructions for providing
the senior officer an alternative posting forthwith. The police administration in
a show of rare defiance resisted the instructions of the Chief Secretary till the
latter’s retirement later. It was only after the principal secretary of the chief
minister took interest in the case that files moved against the wishes of the home
secretary and the four month vanavasa of the senior police officer came to an end.
En attendant, the subordinate with criminal charges continued bien chausse in his
cushy job. The new Chief Secretary in the beginning dovetailed to the depraved
home secretary against the sound judgment of his predecessor on the ground that
he never had an opportunity to know the senior police officer. This is how police
administration is run in India.
HUMAN RESOURCES STIFLED
A serious lapse of police administration in India is its presumed virtue of
indifference to other’s predicaments and idee fixe to distance from noble human
values. The compulsions of being led and the sequacious tendencies cap-a-pie
gratuitously deprive government officials the great human gifts like freedom of
thought, originality and creativity and drain off feelings and sensibilities. It is why
common human sense treats odd to find intellectuals poets, artists or genius
among government officials. The humble situation is spawned for government
officials by themselves by their overzeal to conform. An outcome of the
ambience is administration going heartless and mindless, dry and irresponsive to
the core to its surroundings. While arrogance of power adds to this, the situation
becomes worse. This is the position in which police administration finds itself.
The need of making virtue of the irresponsiveness leads to mendacity, dishonesty
and immunity. Finding honest and dependable people there, finding people of
character and integrity, finding a genius or creative soul at any level in police
administration is like finding a peepal tree in a desert. Normal human courtesies
are unknown there. Evasion is the stock reply for queries. Vanity is the hallmark.
Ironically, these negative qualities are increasingly pro rata to the heights in the
ladder of the police administration. Approach to all except higher-ups is always
brusque and stroppy. Normal man-to-man interaction is impossible unless one
is capable of gratifying. Public relations are an unknown concept McGregor’s
need hierarchy and such man-management concepts are nonexistent in their
vocabulary and thoughts. Efficient management of human resources is a fool’s
paradise to them. They find the greatest virtue of administration in ruthlessness.

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In the process, human resources wither and gargantuan wastage of manpower

becomes a common phenomenon of the police.
BREAKING THE SPINE
Police force is a vital instrument that if brought on knees can be of immense
help to stave off the interferences of the rule of law and its enforcers and help
to lead a good and comfortable life sans the fear of law and law-enforcers.
Breaking and bringing on knees individual policemen is a clavis to this end. Police
administrators know this secret as none else. They know that nothing works on
police as fear at whatever ranks. They know that the advantages of a policeman
broken of spine and reined-in easily outweighs the risks of breaking his spine by
whatever means and that the policeman goes to any extent even at risks to his life
and honour to gratify and pander to the needs of his master, because of his
sequacious job culture. This is the reason why police administrators spare no
efforts and lose no opportunities to beat, terrify and cow down a policeman of
whatever rank, status and enlightenment though they know well that they are
sacrificing the interests of the professional pride of the police, its commitment
to the profession, efficiency, organizational interests, the interests of the rule of
law and national interests at the altar of their personal grists in doing that. Service
rules and jus naturale are arriere concerns to them in exercise of their governmental
powers to chevir this goal. No normal human concerns or common courtesies
for fellow beings deter them from pursuing their evil designs. The recent
example is an upright officer of the rank of Additional Director General of
Police in a state. A scholar in diverse fields, he is known not to easily bend against
his conscience. This rendered him unpopular to the police administration. While
he was holding the post of state prisons chief in 1995, he addressed government
about tragic security lapses in a major prison of the state and sent proposals to
government for improving the situation. The government took no actions on
them. In the closing months of 1995, a mafia gang war ensued in the state capital
led to murder of a gang leader lodged in the prison. Government ordered an
enquiry into the matter by the home secretary of the state. The latter that algate
found the ADGP of his same age, rank and status an inconvenient candidate for
his esoteric urge of bringing police to submission. He found a golden
opportunity in the enquiry. The ADGP was immediately removed from his
position and refused any posting for the next 3-4 months though as the state
prisons chief, he cannot be held responsible for the security breach in the prison,
particularly while the government ignored his report on the matter. If anybody
was to be acted on a highest level for lapses in the prison, it was the home
secretary for not acting on the report of the ADGP. If it is the position of officers

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at highest ranks in the police in the hands of police administration, how

precarious is that down the ladder, can only be imagined.
ROLE OF PERSONAL GAINS
The apostasy and prevarications of the police administration from the right
path in most cases is not even a malfeasance to achieve right professional ends.
They mostly are pure and simple means to self-grandiosity and personal grists.
The fact is that police administration seld goes to any length of initiatives and risks
for purely administrative reasons unless some elements of personal gains are
involved. As far as purely administrative reasons are concerned, the communi
consensu among police administrators is for letting the police carcass boil in its own
broth uninterfered. After all, who wants the risks of awakening the sleeping
monster? Somehow the police function, and let it do so as long as possible. Who
knows how the monster may react while they loosen or tighten a screw or a nut
here and there. Who wants gratuitous risks? It is the reigning thought of Indian
police administration in normal times. Show them elements of personal grists.
Lo, colours of everything changes and risks become sine qua non of the
administration. Files move fast. Discussions and meetings are held day and night
Decisions are taken overnight. Procedures are cut-short to ease the process.
Ordinary situation turns to an emergency. Administration becomes a hub of
incessant activity. Lots of energy and thought go to the process of administration.
The result is that work is done irrespective of the relevance and importance of
the work while more pressing and vital, but less remunerative works rot in files
for years. Selection and recruitment of men in the age of prolate unemployment
and purchase of heavy vehicles in the ambience of commissions play a pivotal
role in the administration of police and related safety oriented organisations.
Recruiting men in thousands and purchase of scores of heavy vehicles in a single
go in the name of expansion of an organisation involves subterranean change of
hands of crores of rupees at a short span of time. It is a dizzy amount to be
pocketed with little risk. Decisions were taken by the administration for
expansion of the organisation with fresh recruitment of thousands of men and
sub-officers and purchase of scores of heavy vehicles. A police officer in a
sensitive juncture of his career that could be compromised was put in charge of
the organisation and the selection and purchase processes. The setup worked out
by the home secretary worked to his satisfaction. The result was that the police
officer in charge was rewarded in oodles. The concerned organisation saw rapid
expansion. Thousands of unemployed youths got job. Manufacturers of heavy
vehicles got business. And the home secretary got what he wanted. Thus all are
happy and contented. This is how administration works in India.

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Most ills of present Indian police emerge from the malaise of the morbid
handling of the police administration at different levels. Be it in handling of the
body and shape of the organisation and its functions or managing the spirit and
the soul of the force, police administration can play a major role either in building
or marring the prospects of raising a healthy police outfit for the country. As on
today, police administration failed the country and its police by indifference on
one hand and crass handling of the organisation and its affairs on the other. The
only solution on this serious malady lies in rebuilding police administration with
people of character, integrity devotion, efficiency, ability and above all, deep
insight to human nature and its problems.

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