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Social role of police and need for new law
Razzak Raza
Zorina Bewa is an octogenarian woman who lost her husband some 20 years ago. She has two sons and four daughters and a dozen grand children. She possesses 50 decimals of land which became the bone of contention among her children and grand children. Upon a promise of providing with two times meals in a day, Zorina donated her land to one of her grandchildren, Jamal. Shrewd Jamal wrongly thought that the old lady would find her way to the graveyard in a few years, if not a few months, and thus, he would gain the land easily by not feeding his grandmother for years. He fed his grandmother for few months. But he is not a well-to-do man. He refused to feed the helpless old grandmother. Zorina went to the local headmen. But nobody could change his mind; Jamal would neither provide the old woman with food nor would he give back the donated land to her.
Finding no other way, the old lady went to the police station and described her woes to the officer-in-charge. The officer-in-charge was a law-abiding police officer. He found no sections in his law books to prosecute Zorina's grandchild, Jamal. He told the lady that it was not a problem for the police to solve. The police enforce criminal laws of cognizable nature. Her problem was of civil nature and she could go to the civil court for redress. The old lady went back home blaming the Creator for granting her a long life.
In the meantime, the officer-in-charge got transferred. A new officer-in-charge joined the police station. With a hope to get redress of the injustice from her grandchild, Jamal, the old lady revisited the police station and saw the new OC. The new OC gave a patient hearing to the old woman. But the new OC also found the problem of the old woman undefined in his charter of duties. He perused the Criminal laws anew. But no procedure was suggested in the Criminal Procedure Code to address this problem. The Police Regulations of Bengal too incorporated no rules to solve this sort of problems. The framers of Indian Penal Code failed to visualise that old woman like Zorina Bewa would approach the police stations to get rid of such social problems. The Children Act-1974 protects the younger generation from probable offences and negligence, but the officer-in-charge discovered no legal guarantee for the old human being from social injustice.
Police discretion
But police discretion begins where the law ends. The OC decided to help the old woman by applying his discretion. He sent an officer to nab the grandchild. The Section 54 of the Cr.PC gave a legal footing to him to help the destitute lady. The police have a powerful weapon -- the power of arrest. Everybody is afraid of being arrested. And it is also widely believed that the police can do anything and many things with the weapon of Section 54.
Jamal gave in to the OC. He was forced to return the land to the old lady. The lady redistributed the land to her two sons. They took the responsibility to feed the old woman. The police in front of the local elite and headmen solved this non-police problem. The local people promised to work as watch dogs to ensure that the old lady was given with food and lodging properly by her sons.
There are numerous non-police problems like that of old Zorina which a police officer needs to solve. These problems have hardly any link with the regular police responsibilities. These are purely social problems, which arise when traditional and established social norms are broken and social values are overlooked. The leaders of the society, social workers, and the social welfare departments of the Government should solve these problems.
The civil matters are directly tried by the civil courts. Police are not allowed to interfere with the civil cases. But, police, though primarily a crime-fighting organization, have to solve all these social problems, because no other means has been found to solve them. They are the residual problems of society. The public wants a general-purpose emergency government service, available to handle problems that arise.
It is true that the number of cognizable cases has increased over the years. But at the same time the non-crime duties increased manifold. The verification of antecedents of the Government servants, the passport verification, issuing police clearance, attending traffic accident and enquiring public petitions and other non-criminal works keep the police busy all the year round.
Paradoxically, the social service role of the police work is not evaluated in the official statistics. Only the cognizable cases and execution of warrants are shown in the monthly and annual conference. Statistics available at Police Head Quarters shows the number of recorded crimes in sixteen heads. But many old people like Zorina Bewa were attended by the officers is completely missing from the performance list.
The framers of the existing police act (Act 5 of 1861) never thought of Zorina Bewa. They wanted to raise a police force only to fight against crime. No commitment towards the community was included in the Police Act. In 1861, police officers never encountered such kind of social problems as one the old lady in question brought to. By the passes of time our flags changed twice, our society developed, population grew manifold and modernity broke the old aged homogeneous social fabrics. But our police are put to the same statutory cache.
If the officer-in-charge who tried to give old Zorina Bewa a redress, preferred not to heed her, no proceeding could be drawn against him. On the contrary, he could be prosecuted for illegal arrest of the old lady's grandson. This is the law by which our police are expected to solve social problems.
The world of policing has changed its direction from merely fighting against crime to rendering social service. The era of community policing began in the Western world in the early seventies of the last century, and in Bangladesh it is knocking at the door.
Not every problem arising in the society could be and should be enlisted and defined in the statutes. Like the police of developed countries, Bangladesh police now need to develop a mechanism to address social problems with close coordination with the members of society.
Bangladesh police have changed their attitudes in recent years. The post of a service delivery officer has been created in the police stations for attending and counseling the visitors to initiate the legal process.
We need a change in the Police Act and regulations. So, the old Police Act has to be re-written. Police must be declared as a government agency for rendering social services. The crime fighting role of the police must be overrun by the social service liabilities.
The draft police ordinance 2007 circulated by the Police Reform Programme has addressed this issue. It declares and addresses social problems of the democratic society in its preamble.
It shall be obligatory for every police officer to-
a) behave with respect and courtesy towards the public;
b) render requisite assistance to the victim of crime, exploitation, accident, natural calamities and disaster;
c) promote sense of security amongst the public with special emphasis on the poor, disabled or physically weak and elderly persons;
d) guarantee the fundamental rights and freedom as enshrined in the Constitution of the People's Republic of Bangladesh;
e) prevent all forms of harassment against women and children; and
f) foster community partnership in policing.
A police officer shall make every effort to-
a) provide relief to people in distress situation,
b) provide support to victims of crime and accident,
c) assist accident and crime victims or their heirs or their dependants, where applicable, with such information and documents as would facilitate their compensation claims; and
d) build awareness among the victims of crime and accidents of their rights and privileges.
I think these are the voices of the common people of the country who have been dreaming of a democratic and exploitation free even society since the independence. We want to change our police. The police of the colonial era cannot serve a free nation. So, let us have a police force that will shake off their colonial attitudes. And for its prerequisite, we must introduce a new police act and send the existing one to the museum.
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Quest for a soul mate
Maswood Alam Khan
The ability to remember the past is no doubt a sign of good health; but inability to forget the details of past pains is a signature of bad health. We mourn deaths of our dear ones as we leave them buried; we grieve loss of wealth; our hearts get heavy as we find ourselves unable to help the needy, tears well up in our eyes as we raise hands to reciprocate our friends' bidding us farewell. With peace and pains and loss and gains intertwined our life is like a creeper that grips anything supportable to move ahead forgetting painful memories and relishing sweet reminiscences, hiding the thorns of pains with flowers of pleasures.
There seems not much of a difference between clutters of machines and interactions among humans when both humans and machinery run day and night like clockwork. With a view to humanizing the mechanized life concerned sociologists are now encouraging people to increase the size and latitude of their friendship networks; because friendship offers you a space to breathe in, and a respite when you can renew yourself by the touch of an empathizer.
There are times when your job or your lifestyle compels you to lead a solitary life; in spite of keeping yourself as busy as a bee with loads of works a strong feeling of emptiness and isolation alienates you from humdrum of life. Silence pervades in the crowd of noises. In your attempts to free yourself from the prison of loneliness suddenly you find yourself befriending books; your painful solitude melts away and your inner hollowness gives way to time and space for reflections. Being alone can be experienced as emotionally refreshing too if you know how to regulate your solitude by sharing your time with friends like newspapers, TV, books, music etc.
In our societal life we come across some characters who become so friendly that it seems they were known for a long time; you feel attached with him, you seek closeness to him and you feel secure when he is around you. Such a person may be your very old friend, your office colleague, your assistant, just an acquaintance or your roommate in a prison cell. At times he, to you, is more trustworthy than your closest relations; it is important you have someone like him you can confide in. If you are a woman such a friend may be a man and you can't think of any biological relation with him, because s/he, however pretty or ugly, is your soul mate. When you are down the first person you talk to over telephone or in person is that soul mate of yours.
More in the Orient than in the Occident and especially in countries like ours nuclear families, or what we call 'joint' families, closely glued to members of first and second degree relations fostered social harmony and peace till middle of the last century when life was not so wrought by economic hardships; unions among family members were similar in character to that by which particles of quicksilver find a unity together through the process of chemical affinity; families in clusters found a shield against spasms of calamities like famine and economic depressions that visited them before second World War. But tragic consequences of large-scale developments and nerve-wrecking races for livelihood to catch up with rapid industrialization made family bonds split ushering in a his-his, whose-whose culture.
Marriage ties that are bound by love get frayed when either of the spouses chip in with anything that relates to money; then words of love go in one ear and out the other and ultimately as the novelty of married life begins to wear off the fatigued 'pigeon of love' with its frayed wings flies away at the slightest chance of finding the window ajar.
While choosing a spouse one should be mad keen more on the inner layers of neuron-deep intellects of her/his Mr or Miss Right than on his/her outer layers of skin-deep beauties. Veneers of nail polish, tufts of dyed hairs or a heart tattooed on his/her left cheek can be seen but warmth of intellect is an invisible aura radiated by your friend you can feel only if your wavelength tunes in to his/hers. A professor of psychology may be intellectually bankrupt, but a boy or a girl who never crossed the threshold of a school may intellectually be a prodigy; intellect is a mental--to some extent genetic--ability empowered by a kind of sixth or seventh sense.
Motivated by time-honoured experience parents opt for getting their children married with non-relations to widen the circle of family and diversify characters of their progenies. Marital bonding among close relations yielded negative social and biological ramifications. Centrifugal tendency played a dominant role in human bonding resulting in a gossamer and multilateral pattern of culture, creed, color and behavior of a broader society.
Weak social ties, sociologists now argue, are responsible for the majority of the embeddedness and structure of social networks as well as the transmission of information through these networks. Acquaintances, by contrast, know people that we do not, and thus receive more novel information.
Our blood is not as cold as of reptiles like snakes, crocodiles and tortoises that lay eggs; we are mammalian like cows; we are soft-hearted like cats, we are emotional like elephants; we love our babies and we never abandon our youngs after their birth though some reptiles do leave their eggs laid. That's why we are chummy more with a dog than with a snake.
Rabindranath Tagore sang: Jodi tor daak shooney keo naa ashey, tobey ekla cholo rey. (Walk alone if no one responds to your call to come along). If you are lonely, if your love for some humans is unrequited, if nobody cares to walk with you hand in hand, don't bother; walk alone along with your pet dog, the loveliest friend who knows when you are down and will perk your mood up; he will dance and prance at your knocking at the door, wagging his tail at your calling his name, rolling on the floor at your scolds, hugging your feet at your doting, smooching your ears at your leisure and talking with you--when you are lonely--in symbols intoning his moans in diatonic scales ascending and descending in a clearer melody than series of tones a piano's finest octave can produce. We may live longer, our high blood pressure may be lesser, our mood may be merrier with a pet dog by our side than without.
We must have a soul mate!
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A first-person report
State of women in Iraq
IWPR Correspondent in Baghdad
Ayesha, not her real name, said, "My neighbourhood in Baghdad was once known for its luxurious houses and large gardens. It was a quiet place when I moved here in 1990. After the fall of Baghdad in 2003, everything changed. I started to hear strange stories about people being killed and kidnapped, some of whom I knew. Residents began leaving for safer areas.
Then it got even worse. By 2005, my neighbourhood had gained the reputation of being one of the most dangerous places in the capital. A Sunni extremist group calling itself the "Islamic State of Iraq" took over, declaring my neighbourhood their stronghold in Baghdad.
Then and now
I was in primary school in 1990, and in the afternoons, children would spill out of school and the streets would fill with shoppers, bringing the neighbourhood to life. We would often stay out until midnight, even during the difficult days of the United Nations sanctions.
One of the things that I enjoyed about the neighbourhood was its diversity. My closest friend, Thanaa, lived two blocks away. While she was pious and I am secular, such things were not an issue for us. She went to the mosque almost every day to pray and to hear the sermons of the imam. Although I wanted to accompany her, I never had enough faith to do so.
The members would patrol the area by night, either on foot or in cars. They has weapons slung over their shoulders and would shoot people dead in the street for breaking one of their "rules".
We learned of their "laws" from their flyers, which told residents not to dare challenge their authority or work with the Americans, and also praised al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. It was common knowledge that they used a local mosque as a meeting place and to store weapons.
They made it clear that one of their objectives was to rid our neighbourhood of Shias.
I hadn't thought much about sectarianism when I was growing up because it wasn't an issue in this neighbourhood. However, it entered my life one hot afternoon when there was a knock on the door. It was Thanaa and her mother, who had received a note telling them, "Get out, you Shia people."
"It is over," said Thanaa, speaking not only for herself but for most of the Shias in our neighbourhood. "We can't stay here any longer. They threatened to kill all of us if we stay, and they have even banned me from praying in the mosque, saying it's for Sunnis only. I will miss you."
We hugged and cried, and she was gone.
For those of us who stayed, life changed dramatically. Although my family is secular, we are Sunni by background, so we were not threatened with sectarian attack. However, for the first time in my life, I could not leave the house without putting a scarf on my head and wearing long sleeves and skirts. Trousers, of course, were out of the question. I made sure never to wear make-up when leaving the house.
My parents are liberal and never told me what to wear, so I enjoyed a lot of freedom growing up. The new restrictions were difficult for me to take. I have complied with the new "laws" of my neighbourhood, while my blood silently boiled.
The consequences of not complying were made clear. A friend of mine once rushed into my house, her voice trembling as she told me how she had almost been killed. The skirt she was wearing was long but too tight-fitting, and caught the eye of a militiaman who stopped her and threatened to kill her if she ever dared to leave the house like that again.
Boys were banned from wearing shorts or certain hairstyles that might stand out. The school I once attended is gender-segregated now. After it was attacked and a pupil killed, children stopped going to class.
Our once-bustling central shopping street emptied, and all of the shops were forced to close.
It was one of the worst times of my life, and I hope that it remains a thing of the past.
After two years of continuous suffering, the situation has now started to improve somewhat. My neighbourhood pressured the government to include us in the Baghdad security plan, and members of the Sunni "Awakening Councils" who have pledged to cooperate with the government helped establish security.
My neighbours are slowly beginning to return from places such as Syria, where many of then had run out of money. They hardly recognise the neighbourhood, which is a shell of its former self after fighting between the Islamic extremists and Iraqi and US forces.
A Shia woman named Um Salam has come home. However, she says the memories are almost too difficult to bear. She is selling her furniture and will not be staying on. Her son Salam was killed by al-Qaeda.
"I can't stand living in my house any more," she told me. "Each wall and corner reminds me of Salam.... He was a peaceful, quiet boy who was killed because of his sect. It is unjust."
I recently decided to venture out and wander the streets. This was unheard of just two months ago, when I would only go directly from my house to university and return home by dark.
It was quiet, and security forces were everywhere. The neighbourhood still feels like a ghost town, a war zone. Many houses have been destroyed, although a few shops have reopened with the help of a 2,500 US dollar incentive given by the government. Some of the beautiful old historic buildings have been burnt or blown up, and the largest pharmacy is closed.
The people in my neighbourhood generally divide into two groups - those who believe something good will come out of all this and security will improve; and those who believe that the "Islamic State" group is still active and will return to take control of the area again. Thus, even with the improved security, we remain uneasy, as one question lingers at the back of our minds - will we be safe again?
This is the first in a new series of first-person reports from IWPR Iraq called "Iraqi Women's Voices". The writer's name and the name of her neighbourhood have not been revealed because of security concerns. All other names have also been changed.
-Institute of Peace and War Reporting
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