A Cop-Out With Numbers

Context: The assumption that understaffed, under-resourced and overworked police officers are a primary reason for the general inefficiency of Indian police must be rejected.

Arguments against the Direct Relation between Police Strength and it’s efficiency

• There is no UN recommendation on police personnel ratio: instead, Vienna-based UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) gives a numerical recommendation of 222 police personnel per lakh population.
  • While India’s actual strength (sanctioned strength is 181) nears 140 per lakh.
• Possibility of shortcomings in police strength statistics: is admitted by 2010 European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control paper, ‘International Statistics on Crime and Justice.’
  • It also says that a police force is not a monolithic entity with similar structures and tasks worldwide.
  • It may not be prudent to judge India’s police strength (122.5) democratic set-up with and West Asian monarchies like Brunei (1,087) and Kuwait (1,065.2) and Bahrain (1,866.7).
• Police workload is minimal: Serious crimes (Murder and rape - 1% each, rash driving- 11% of total crimes) are less compared to petty crimes like Prohibition Act (28.9%) and Motor Vehicles Act (10.5% ).
  • Police workload on account of law and order situations, whether as per the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) data or the annual police stations survey is not overwhelming.
  • A total of 63,359 offences registered against public tranquillity during 2019 means 3.8 such instances per police station in a year.
• Increasing strength does not improve law and order:
  • Nagaland (1,108 police personnel more than sanctioned) and Uttar Pradesh (police were raised by one lakh personnel in a year) show no sign of improvement in law and order situations.
  • Determining the sanctioned strength lacks an assessment of the policing requirement.
  • India has the largest police force in the world (more than 20 lakh police personnel).

Conclusion: The assumption that more police officers will also produce a higher output must therefore be rejected.