"You are men and women of violence,” proclaims Dave Grossman, a retired military officer, to eager police trainees in the award-winning documentary Do Not Resist. One wonders if he draws his inspiration from the policing tactics so infamously practised in Pakistan, where such a declaration seems less an instruction and more a statement of fact.
While everyone in Pakistan has long been aware of the police culture in vogue in the country, the post-May 9, 2023 posturing of the police gave a rude awakening to a large chunk of the citizenry because, this time round, even those belonging to the affluent class were exposed to a brand of policing thus far reserved only for the poor and downtrodden — ‘militarised policing.’
According to criminal justice expert Peter Kraska, ‘militarised policing’ is a policing style that “increasingly draws from and patterns around the tenets of militarism and the military model.” In Pakistan, this has manifested in the widespread adoption of military tactics and an organisational structure that emphasises force and domination, particularly towards the powerless and marginalised segments of society. The events of May last year stirred up a national debate, and the long-interred topic of police reforms was soon disinterred.
As a result, multiple articles and opinions appeared in national dailies, wherein writers sought to identify the wrong and recommended measures to cure the malaise. What these articles, mostly authored by retired police officers, had in common was that almost every piece ascribed the streak of violence perpetrated by the police force in the aftermath of the unfortunate events of May 9, 2023 to the politicisation of the force and argued for depoliticisation.
Politicisation of the police is certainly one of the issues that must be dealt with, but it is only a partial diagnosis of the rot, as it is hard to ignore that the personnel of law enforcement always seem ready to embrace violence, even when they are not dictated to by their political overlords. The excessive use of violence underscores the notion that the issue is inherently internal and can be resolved from within.
As a member of the police force who has seen the issues that plague the system, in this article I will delineate the specific internal challenges within police departments that foster a militarised approach to law enforcement. Importantly, these challenges do not stem from the oft-cited issue of political interference. Instead, they are intrinsic problems that can be effectively addressed from within the department, without the need for external intervention.
The people of Pakistan generally fear rather than trust the police and the police’s high-handedness in dealing with the public is regular fodder for stories in the media. But is the issue only the politicisation of the force and political interference, as many high-ranking police officers will have you believe? A serving police officer offers a different perspective, focusing on the rot within the system…
ORGANISATIONAL IDENTITY
The issue is less to do with politicisation and more to do with the organisational identity of the department. Organisational identity — the collective understanding of what defines an organisation’s central, enduring and distinctive characteristics — significantly influences the behaviour of its members. This identity not only shapes how members perceive themselves within the organisation but also guides their actions and interactions with others, both inside and outside the organisation.
The organisational identity of the police force in Pakistan has been shaped by an enduring colonial hangover. It is hardly a new revelation that this force was raised by the region’s colonial masters with an aim of suppressing and subjugating the natives.
In his book Defenders of the Establishment: Ruler-Supportive Police Forces of South Asia, K.S Dhillon, a retired officer of the Indian Police Service, says: “The Indian police was never meant to be a citizen-friendly agency. At no time in history was it expressly required to fulfil any role other than defending and safeguarding the ruling establishment. Its design, structure, attitudes, values, functional modes and legal backdrop were all geared to serve the government in power and maintain status quo in society. If in the process the mass of the people come to grief, so be it.”
This is what the real identity of the force and its members has been ever since it was raised, and police are not willing to shed this identity even today. After Independence, the role and character of the force should have been changed, but it was kept intact. Many have blamed the political leadership for this, but the buck actually stops with the police leadership, which could not get out of the mindset of ‘sahib bahadur’ [imitating Western ways and airs] and, in fact, took pride in carrying on the colonial legacy.
This identity gives a sense of superiority to policemen and, while dealing with citizens, they behave as if they are the masters. The ‘Annual Report on Police Reforms in Pakistan (2020)’ by the Justice Project Pakistan states that police behaviours and attitudes towards civilians are reflective of a ruling rather than serving attitude. The report cites numerous cases where police actions are characterised by an abuse of power and a disregard for civilian rights, reinforcing the perception of the police as a force that sees itself as ‘rulers’ over ‘subjects’ rather than protectors of the community.
The report particularly points to the widespread use of arbitrary detention and excessive force as indicators of this problematic stance. This identity manifests itself when a policeman who is manning a road picket or standing guard at a place, capriciously stopping and frisking passersby, gets irritated if one dares to question the legality or necessity of his........