he politicisation
of enactments often overshadows any serious discussion on the desirability of a
law, its potentiality, ambit of provisions and overall impact on society. Debate
on the central government’s suggestions to tone down the stringency of the
Gujarat Control of Organised Crime (GCOC) Bill proposed by the Gujarat
government is the latest instance of the usual drama.
Jurists, criminologists, human rights activists and
public-spirited apolitical citizens should opine on the necessity, applicability
and scope for misuse of the proposed law instead of political leaders indulging
in mud-slinging on peripheral issues. Can the menace of terrorism and covertly
prepared and executed attacks in the form of bomb blasts, assassinations,
disruption of public life and so on be prevented by giving the police unlimited
powers? The answer is a big no because our law enforcement agencies, whether
local police or special task units or paramilitary forces, have not so far
demonstrated the necessary maturity or concern for the letter and spirit of the
fundamental rights, a highly laudable and enforceable component of the Indian
Constitution.
In practice, there have been no instances of self-correction and
reform by our policing institutions. In none of the cases of human rights
violations pertaining to the communal riots of 1984 (Delhi) or 2002 (Gujarat)
and numerous encounter killings has the police hierarchy suo motu exposed the
deviant functionaries and penalised them. On the contrary, top police officers
have always shielded the wrongdoers, even convincing politicians to comply,
harping on the slogan of police morale. Invariably, culpability is reluctantly
accepted only when there is judicial intervention as in the case of the
Bhagalpur blindings, the encounter killing of Sohrabuddin Sheikh in Gujarat and
deaths in police custody.
Any move to reveal the truth that would adversely affect those
rash and pseudo-adventurist police officers who commit excesses, mostly to
please their political masters and thereby further their own careers, is looked
upon as a sin and an assault on police interests. That whistle-blower, a rare
species indeed, would be ostracised by his colleagues. What’s more, the
establishment would undoubtedly resort to unholy means to ‘discipline’ him.
In this reality, making confessions before a police officer
(however senior he may be) admissible as evidence would be fatally injurious to
the rule of law and human rights. Political leaders who have been clamouring for
such arbitrary police powers could well fall victim to such powers in a changed
situation.
Secondly, the convenience of making an accused person’s
confession admissible would prompt the police to take the line of least
resistance and avoid painstaking investigation through the collection of
scientific evidence, construction of the chain of circumstances surrounding a
crime and uncovering the entire network of criminals and the ramifications of
their crimes. In short, the admissibility of confessions would undermine police
professionalism and weaken the pursuit of skilful investigation.
Terrorists and extremists are a minority in society, fuelled by
the courage of their convictions and a missionary zeal to achieve their goal by
hook or by crook. Public pressure for swift detection and arrest of culprits in
a terrorist crime often tempts policemen to book suspects without sufficient
convincing evidence. Backed by the evidentiary efficacy of confessions, the
police would likely be driven to book sympathisers or affiliates of the
terrorist outfits presumably responsible for a crime or those persons in an
organisation who, as a tactic, claim responsibility for the terrorist act. This
suicidal move would facilitate the escape of the real planners, organisers,
mobilisers and executors of the crime from the clutches of the law. They could
then go on to plan more dastardly acts with greater audacity and assured
immunity. No detection is better than incorrect detection, in a long-term war
against terrorism.
Existing laws in India already facilitate police processes.
Under Section 27 of the Indian Evidence Act, any information obtained by a
police officer from a suspect in police custody is admissible evidence. The
Gujarat police have not been able to unearth the network and resources of the 20
or so persons killed in encounters from October 2002 to February 2007 for their
alleged plot to kill the chief minister and other VIPs. Was this because of the
inadequacy of our laws or in fact a result of superfluous investigation and the
absence of professional acumen?
Timely intelligence and its prompt operational utilisation are
imperative for the neutralisation of terrorism. Counteraction or curative action
should start from the gestation period of indoctrination, enrolment of recruits
and their training, mobilisation of resources, creation of sanctuaries and
striking cells, planning, preparation and perpetration of crimes. Incorporation
of the proposed amendments to the GCOC Bill will not handicap the police in
information collection, collation and analysis, or in operational use of
intelligence, or in arrests, prosecution, conviction and decimation for the
containment of terrorism.
Extension of the detention period from 90 to 180 days and
curtailment of the courts’ authority to grant bail, as proposed in the GCOC
Bill, amount to a retrogressive descent into police raj.
The efficacy of any legislation in a democratic nation lies in
its intent to safeguard and sustain the rule of law and the rights of the
weakest and the voiceless and not in injecting legal ammunition into police
guns. Let us take care of the last man, in tune with Mahatma Gandhi’s concept of
antyodaya, and guard against police boots crushing our citizens.