Click to play videoNew Delhi: Policemen are in focus all across the country. First, the Hyderabad Police have been accused of failing to act professionally in dealing with the twin blasts that rocked the city on Saturday night. They failed to cordon off the site and the site seemed as if it was a tourist spot.
Then, on Tuesday, gory images of police brutality in Bihar's Bhagalpur district shocked the country. A chain-snatcher became a victim of mob fury, with policemen just looking on.
On Monday, a man — identified as Salim — was caught trying to snatch a woman's chain in the Nath Nagar area of Bhagalpur. A mob soon gathered and beat up the man. His hands were tied behind his back as the crowd kicked and punched him in the face.
Salim was later tied to a motorcycle and dragged around. The footage shows a policeman riding the motorcycle to which he was tied. All this while the policemen present there did nothing to stop the mob.
Meanwhile, in the Sanjay Dutt case, a policeman has been threatened with suspension for hugging the star when he left Yerwada jail on his interim bail.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh has overturned Deputy Chief Minister’s R R Patil’s order of suspending the policemen who hugged Dutt.
Patil had suspended the police constable because he hugged the actor outside the Yerwada jail gate after Dutt was released. Police personnel are forbidden from socialising with convicts according to the police code of conduct.
The incident took a political turn after the Maharashtra unit of the BJP asked the state government to take action against state minister Baba Siddiqui. The BJP says that Siddiqui was at Dutt’s home to welcome him when the actor was released on bail.
The cases of police atrocity and insensitivity in India are again coming to the fore. The question that was being discussed on CNN-IBN's Face The Nation was: Should the policeman who hugged Sanjay Dutt be suspended?
On the panel of experts to try and answer the question were DG, Bureau of Police Research & Development, Kiran Bedi; BJP leader Vijay Sahasrabuddhe and Managing Partner, Counselage, Suhel Seth.
Professionalism On The Decline
Some would defend the policeman who hugged Sanjay Dutt saying that he should not have been singled out and that he was the victim of a larger malaise — a malaise by which the lines between celebrity and criminality have become blurred.
However, Kiran Bedi, tough cop that she is, did not agree with this point of view at all.
She said that professionalism was on the decline simply because of the absence of rigorous rules of training.
"Policemen need to be taken away from the field and put back in the classrooms. They should undergo a re-audit of their performance and be re-trained. However, in a situation where policemen cannot even be given a leave of absence from duty, granting them time off for re-training seems absolutely out of the question," she said.
She also added that lines were getting blurred for over the years, policemen developed their own affections and tended to express their emotions in unprofessional ways.
No Special Treatment For Cops
Bedi said that scores of politicos and civil servants had fallen prey to the malaise, the latest being the case of a district magistrate who fell at Shibu Soren's feet.
"Why should we blame only policemen for everything? They are only a part of the celebrity culture to which even ministers and civil servants have become susceptible," she said.
Vinay Sahasrabuddhe agreed that policemen should not be considered differently.
"If viewed professionally then some action needs to be taken against the policemen. There appear to be different rules for different people. When politicians -- and that too from the ruling party are solidly standing behind Sanjay Dutt and openly proclaiming their solidarity, how can the police be treated differently?” he questioned.
With politicians like Priyaranjan Dasmunsi and Kapil Sibal expressing solidarity to Sanjay Dutt and the Bollywood fraternity rallying behind him, it seems as if the notion of the law is becoming a bit fuzzy, something that Suhel Seth agreed with.
"The law hardly matters to a certain section of the Indian society. It was sad to see a Union Cabinet Minister was openly supporting Sanjay Dutt. If that is the case, then why don’t the ministers support every person convicted?" questioned Seth.
Seth’s other concern was what kind of role models was India creating. "Lalu Prasad is a fugitive. Shibu Soren was convicted by the court and today a district magistrate touched his feet. The men running the country are impervious to any morality anymore," he said.
However, he said that the constable who hugged Sanjay Dutt did not deserve such a harsh punishment as suspension.
Seth also refused to agree with Sahasrabuddhe’s concern for Siddiqui. "He (Sahasrabuddhe) should be more worried about the degradation and depravation in Indian politics caused by his party than about petty issues such as these,” Seth said.
Sahasrabuddhe was ready with a retort and pat came the reply, "The Congress party, the grand old party, should give us some examples that can be followed then. It has simply become fashion now to call BJP as a communal party."
However, Suhel Seth argued that the question was not about BJP alone but about the continuous degradation of political leadership in India.
"There are three things that are causes of worry. First, no one cares about the law. Second, when you care about the law then you care less by issuing directives. And third, are politicians the right kind of role models for us, when they keep popping in and out of jail?"
Suspension Is Not The Answer
The question that is uppermost on most minds these days is -- if policemen are not suspended for inciting riots, if they are not suspended for failing to be professionals after a bomb blast then why should they be suspended for hugging an actor, especially when they are simply emulating politicians and civil servants?
Kiran Bedi said that in a case as trivial as hugging an actor, issuing a suspension order was simply irrelevant.
"If the case is misconduct then there many other ways of dealing with it other than suspension. There are too many wrongs that have become rights in the country. It is happening in law-enforcement. There are too many shades of gray that have developed a colour by itself," Bedi said.
Suhel Seth was also inclined to blame the media for creating a celebrity circus. However, he said that it was not all the media's fault.
"The media only plays out things that they people want to see. The masses want to see the Bhagalpur mob fury, they want to know what Katrina Kaif wore when she went to meet Salman Khan in jail, or what food Sanjay Dutt is being served in jail. That's the only excitement people have in their lives. We as a nation are willing to intellectually dumb down important things for convenience," Seth said.
Final SMS poll results: Should the policemen who hugged Sanjay Dutt be suspended?
Yes - 35 per cent
No - 65 per cent
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