'Influential' officers, a cause of indiscipline at PHQ

The influential police officers, who manage choice postings for them with the help of politicians, are in fact a cause of indiscipline at the police headquarters. They have grown so powerful that even their seniors avoid intervening in their matters. Against the will of police headquarters, which orders transfers and postings of officers, these cops get significant postings. Only this set of officers are posted as district SPs, SPs, DSPs, SHOs and police post heads at important places. Some even get seniors reprimanded by politicians when they ignore their interests. In one such incident, a police post head was alleged to have got his SHO reprimanded over the failure of his land ‘grabbing’ attempt due to the latter’s intervention. The PP head was alleged to have struck a deal with some land grabbers and asked them to encroach upon a particular piece of land. The insulted SHO had also brought the matter to the notice of his seniors. The influential officers often overstep their legal limits and take law in their hand to assert their authority. One such officer, who was then posted as SHO of a police station, was placed under suspension for standing witness in a ‘fake’ land deal, allegedly duping a celebrity’s brother of a whopping amount. The victim had lodged a complaint against him with the crime branch of Jammu police. Some cops, posted at other police stations and police posts, too have faced allegations of land encroachment from time to time. Some have become so powerful due to the support of their political masters that they get engaged in tussles over postings at the places of their choice. Names of some of them were also dragged in severe controversies and acts of professional misconduct but PHQ had not thought it proper to order probes against them.

Some such police officers have grown extremely rich and own big chunks of land at prime locations. A few of them have retired from services but a few others are still in service. The CID wing of state police too had prepared a detailed report of their alleged unlawful activities and submitted it to the higher authorities. Based on this report, which was leaked to the press, some local newspapers had even carried news stories against these officers but the PHQ had taken no note of these writeups. There should be some independent agency to find out why PHQ is so hesitant in taking departmental action against these officers. And, irony is that these officers manage significant postings for them and those, who have a good track record, continue to be posted at insignificant places.

Indiscipline creeps into any system when these influential officers and politicians run the system in the way they want to. If the BJP-PDP government really wants to bring transparency in the state administration, it has to get away with this system which has not contributed in its improvement. The earlier it is done, the better it would be.