Stress, staff shortage making police brutal in Telangana

HYDERABAD: The state during the past few weeks has witnessed several police brutality and high-handed behaviour cases. Even as the state police faced criticism over such incidents, police personnel said that such behaviour is the result of the working conditions of the officers.

The Telangana state police is reportedly understaffed and police personnel, mostly at the lower level, are said to be under a lot of work-related stress. Not condoning such acts, senior police officials said the stress of work, lack of rest and shortage of staff could be resulting in some men in uniform going beyond their brief when it comes to discharging their duties.

According to the latest Data on Police Organisations (DOPO) released by the Bureau of Police Research & Development (BPR&D), a Central government organisation, the Telangana police department is severely understaffed. The state has 113.67 police personnel for 1 lakh population in the state, against the sanctioned strength of 476.54 personnel for 1 lakh people.

There are 63 Police Commissionerates in the country, of which, the highest number, 11 are in Maharashtra, followed by 9 in Telangana. Few recent police brutality incidents include the merciless beating up of a tribal man in Suryapet, a commuter getting slapped in front of his daughter in Mahbubabad, torturing of a Dalit man in Nalgonda. The most shocking incident was the custodial death of a Dalit woman, who was locked up by the Addagudur police in Yadadri-Bhongir district in a robbery case.

Speaking to Deccan Chronicle about such incidents, Additional Director General of Telangana Police Dr Jitender said these are isolated incidents and strict action is taken against those involved in such cases. “It is the state of mind of some officials, and it is not about them losing self-control. We surely do not justify these acts. Every day, police perform lakhs of operations at junctions, routine checks, and apprehend criminals, and sometimes, somebody makes a mistake like this. It should not happen and it is wrong, which is why appropriate actions are taken,” he said.

Asked about the action taken against officers involved in such incidents, he said that depends on the gravity of the offence — officials either get suspended, are counselled, punished or even dismissed from service. Additional DG of Railways and Road Safety Sandeep Shandilya said such incidents occur as the public does not care about genuine directions and police viewing it seriously.

“Violent protests where the police are outnumbered and lack of rest lead to such incidents,” he added. When asked about such behaviour by police in Hyderabad, Police Commissioner of Hyderabad Anjani Kumar said, “These do not happen in Hyderabad. We in Hyderabad city conduct regular training and counselling for our officers periodically. We keep a system of check and balance and keep identifying black sheep regularly.”

However, 2020 saw numerous incidents of highhandedness by the city police. In April 2020, a video of Moghalpura police station sub-inspector Chandramouli abusing locals and confiscating vehicles of those who had stepped out to get ration had gone viral on social media. Similarly, an auto-rickshaw driver, on his way to refill his LPG gas cylinder, was stopped at Etebar junction by the Mir Chowk traffic police and was assaulted with lathis.