Law enforcement agencies should brace themselves to face the emerging challenges on the law and order front which may be 'very turbulent' in the coming years, Home Secretary Gopal K Pillai said on Monday.
"The law and order situation in the country over the next decades is going to be turbulent. There is no doubt about it. We are not going to have a satisfactory law and order situation for few decades to come. That's partly because there is a huge growth which is taking place," he said.
"You are having 8 to 9 per cent economic growth, you are having the communication revolution, you have rising expectations, and people want the good things in life. They want better opportunities, they want things now," Pillai said.
"They are not willing to wait and, therefore, the law and order is going to be very turbulent over the next decades and for the country as a whole and for the police service particularly," Pillai said. He was speaking at the foundation day ceremony of the Bureau of Police Research and Development.
"We have to manage the situation (for maintenance of law and order) so that we allow this economic growth to take place over the next few decades. This is very essential. We will have to manage the law and order situation. It will call for a lot of innovative strategies," he said.
"I have no doubt whatsoever that police force in India, which has been, if I put it very mildly, abused and degraded. Can it in one sense finally become what it is meant to be -- a friend of the people and the civil population," Pillai said.
Pillai also voiced his concern over corruption prevailing in the police recruitment exercises. "In almost every state, police recruitment is mired in corruption".
"People do not get recruited as constables and sub-inspectors unless money is paid and, therefore, the first level at which you have to stop corruption is at this recruitment process," he said, adding the training of policemen is also "really not up to the mark."
"I am happy to state that in Uttar Pradesh, 39,000 constables were recruited, I think in a very transparent and merit-based manner," he said.
Pillai said such practices, in various domains like recruitment and community policing, undertaken by police forces from various states, should be followed by all.
