Column

It is ironical that loss of human life and humiliation at the hands of men in power, particularly those in uniform, is measured in percentage in this country, where the right to life is a constitutional mandate. The figures are supplied with ease, in complete disregard to the rule of law.

Recent revelations suggest Uttar Pradesh tops the list of states with most (232) innocent deaths in police custody. In the past four years, the state that has been governed by the Samajwadi Party and its arch rival, the BSP, has seen as many as 1,180 people breathe their last in police custody unable to bear the torture.
Watchdog National Human Rights says more than five deaths were reported every day in police stations across the country in the past four years.

If former Haryana DGP SPS Rathore can be charged with driving teen Ruchika Girhotra to suicide, why can’t the same law be applied to officers of the police stations where the 7,300, approximately, people died?

It is an admitted fact that police are a group of trained men armed with CrPC that enjoys absolute powers to nab anyone, even on unfounded suspicion. They are illegally authorised to muzzle the common man who pays for their salaries through taxes. Police are given to believe that they, in fact, rule the country with the help of parliamentary democracy.

The same view has been expressed by National Police Commission. Certain police powers, which involve the exercise of considerable discretion in their day-to-day working, give scope for corruption and malpractices and extortion of and harassment to public, it says.

The power to arrest is the most important in this category. A large number of discretionary arrests not only affect police image, but also provide considerable scope for malpractices and highhandedness. These facts and the frequent public outcry against police excesses do reach the ears of the judges.

“Unless stern measures are taken to check the malady of the fence eating the crop, the foundations of the criminal justice delivery system would be shaken and civilisation would risk the consequence of heading towards decay, resulting in anarchy and authoritarianism,” the judiciary has said.