When the police ended up being policed

The year gone by is going to be remembered by the Karnataka police for many wrong reasons. The highlight remains when the news of a scam swept through law enforcement agencies in August, again bringing discredit to the department. A senior IPS officer, heading the recruitment department, was arrested in the case of what is commonly known now as the PSI recruitment scam

A policeman kicking a woman and dragging her by the hair is not something one would forget in a hurry. Thousands of citizens watched this video in horror — on January 29 this year, when a traffic ASI attached to the Halasuru gate traffic station was caught on camera kicking a woman in the stomach and dragging her by the hair in the street. He accused her of pelting stones at the police vehicle.  

The year gone by is going to be remembered by the Karnataka police for many wrong reasons. In this incident, the woman was later arrested on charges of attacking policemen. She turned out to be the attendant of an illegal parking lot. When policemen came to tow away the vehicles that she was guarding, she vented her ire by pelting stones at them.

In response to this, the ASI kicked her and dragged her by her hair. The video of his assault went viral, and caused a huge public outcry. The accused officer was suspended.

Close on the heels of this incident came another video on social media. The video showed the towing vehicle staff carrying away a seized bike while the bike owner was running haplessly behind the vehicle, asking them to return his vehicle. Once again, there was huge outcry on social media. Police were flooded with angry messages. People questioned the audacity and brutality of the police and the towing system, and alleged the police of corruption, which led the government to suspend the towing system till date.

After these two incidents, traffic related problems, including complaints about corruption among officials and bad traffic management, had dogged the police and the State government. The government was forced to review the traffic situation, and create a post of special commissioner for traffic management – to rehaul the traffic management system and also to repair the image of the government and the police.

While the traffic police were still striving to build a friendlier image and gain public trust, news of a scam swept through law enforcement agencies in August, again bringing discredit to the department. A senior IPS officer, heading the recruitment department, was arrested in the case of what is commonly known now as the PSI recruitment scam. The police have now arrested more than 50 people, including Additional Director General of Police (ADGP) Amrit Paul, BJP leader and Jnana Jyothi English Medium School head Divya Hagaragi, Congress block president Mahanthesh D. Patil, his brother Rudragouda Patil, Afzalpur Congress MLA’s gunman Hayyali Desai, Manjunath Melakundi, an assistant engineer, several police officials, and many candidates who topped the list of successful candidates.

Amrit Paul, who is in judicial custody and yet to get bail, had allegedly received crores of rupees through his staff to manipulate OMR answer sheets from the strong room of the CID headquarters. The CID are investigating the scam and have arrested over 120 people, including many serving police personnel for their involvement.