Brothers in arms; not at war

Lt-Gen Harwant Singh (retd)

NOW and then, incidents of military-police confrontation crop up, which need to be handled with maturity. The police, at times, indulges in highhandedness while dealing with soldiers. Often evidence, such as damage to property, furniture and vehicles is created by the police. Unfortunately, the media often buys the story without checking the facts. The recent incident in Arunachal between the police and soldiers brings to mind an incident from the period when I was commanding the division at Kota. 

A soldier was living in civil area with his family. The landlady wanted him to vacate the accommodation as she had been offered higher rent by someone else. She knew the SHO  well and sought his help. 

One evening, when the soldier was on his way to the unit to attend the evening roll call, he was intercepted by a constable and told to report to the police station. The soldier went home and after putting on his uniform, arrived at the police station. On reaching there, he was beaten up by the SHO, and all this while, the landlady sat on a chair watching. He was later locked up in a cell. 

I was informed of the incident the next morning. I asked the SP and the DC to come over to my office. I explained the case to them and said the incident, fortunately, did not take an ugly turn, because troops did not come to know of it. The DC was a mature officer and told me that he would inquire into the case. He went to the police station, investigated the case and suspended the SHO.

Another incident needs recalling. Air service from Kota had just started and I took a flight to Delhi. I was wearing uniform and was being seen off at the airport by a military police officer and few others. The police inspector on duty insisted on carrying out my body search, to which I objected. I was at that point the seniormost military officer serving in Rajasthan. The inspector was also somewhat rude. 

On my return, I wrote a letter to the DGP. He did not respond to my letter, but his staff officer did, obfuscating  the issues I had raised in my letter. The local DIG was also evading the issue. So I took up the case through staff channels and finally it was the PMO that ordered the suspension of the inspector. 

Policemen do some times act as law  unto themselves and their senior officers fail to restrain them. The police is meant to be friendly and help people and not lord over them. Some attitude of the Raj days still lingers with it. The police and the military are operating together in many areas of law and order, so there is no legitimate reason for them to get into any manner of confrontation with one another.