Commonwealth Human Rights Initiative Visiting Programme II:November 15-19, 2010 New Delhi & Kochi

CHRI held its second South Asia Visiting Programme from 15-17 November in New Delhi and the second leg in Kochi, Kerala from 17-19 November. The participants included Mr.Ali Nash’ath Mohamed (Maldives, MDN), Dr. Hala Hameed (Maldives, PIC), Advocate Sipra Goswami (Bangladesh, BLAST) and Mr. Amit Ranjan Dey (Bangladesh, NU) who could join only for the Kochi leg.

Interaction with CHRI

The programme began with an introduction to CHRI’s work through close interaction with each team at CHRI. Participants were given a sense of the direction, the methodology and the rationale behind the work that CHRI does in this field. They were introduced to the latest developments in India, South Asia and East Africa. Subsequently, the participants introduced themselves and their work to the members of the police team. CHRI director, Maja Daruwalla, and the Police team coordinator Navaz Kotwal focused on different ways by which CSOs can carry forward advocacy on police reforms. Emphasis was laid on indicators for illustrating problems in basic governance, complaints management, violent crime, mismanagement of public funds, and other powerful tools such as surveys, studies and data gathering available to any CSO.

The participants then met with Venkatesh Nayak, coordinator of the Right To Information programme at CHRI who gave an overview of CHRI’s pivotal role in the RTI movement in India, the Human Rights Advocacy team at CHRI that summarized CHRI’s work on human rights advocacy at various levels and their massive task on reviewing national human rights institutions worldwide.

Interaction with Nitya Ramakrishnan, Supreme Court Advocate

Nitya Ramakrishnan is a Supreme Court Advocate who has dealt with a large volume of human rights cases. The session with her touched upon the differences between fundamental rights and unalienable human rights, the status of habeus corpus litigation in India, as compared with other South Asian countries. She reiterated that human rights arguments especially in the subcontinent are inimical to the development of national security and that reparations are often the remedy in lieu of a tortuous liability on public servants and the protection offered to them under the existing laws of the country.

Interaction with National Human Rights Commission

The participants held a meeting with the Sh. S.P.Singh(IPS), Deputy Inspector General, Investigations at the National Human Rights Commission of India (NHRC) in Faridkot House. Mr. Singh started by giving participants a brief outline on the Protection of Human Rights Act 1993, the laws which govern the Commission, it’s composition, its powers and duties under the Act, the complaints handling processes and which complaints are entertained or otherwise by the Commission. He went on to elaborate that the NHRC is one of the few NHRI’s with its own investigation wing, and how serving police officers serve with the Commission on deputation. This proved to be one of the most interactive sessions of the programme, with participants cleared their doubts about the Commissions functioning.

Composition of the Investigations Wing of the NHRC

The DIG then went into the complaints procedure in great details and broke it down to each step in the process. The binding powers of the Commission’s recommendations upon state governments in particular were deemed successful, and the DIG commended the governments for cooperating with the Commission so far, and hopes it will only improve over the coming years. The Commission receives a staggering 75,000 to 100,000 complaints every year (sometimes as many as 500 a day). The Commission operates a Complaints Management Information System (CMIS), which has proved to be adequate to manage this vast number of complaints. Compensation according to the DIG, has been the most common form of remedy, and cases once opened by the NHRC are only closed upon receipt of a proof of payment by the respective state authority to the complainant. The DIG also spoke briefly about the complaints procedure for those made with respect to a member of any Central Armed Forces of India (including the Indian Army and paramilitary forces such as the CRPF, BSF, CISF) and that the Commission is not permitted to investigate unless directed to do so by the central government. Finally, the DIG highlighted the accessibility of the Commission in that complaints could be sent via email, telephone, fax, letter, and telegram. This was supplemented by the various workshops, conferences and meetings the Commission holds in smaller towns of India, or with any of the eighteen state level human rights Commissions that have been setup in India.

Visit to Janamaithri Suraksha Police Stations

The main focus of the visit to Kochi was to introduce the participants to the community policing initiatives of the Kerala Police. Community policing was first introduced on an experimental basis in Kerala in 2006 and then later on, a formal project drawn by the Police department known as the Janamaithri Suraksha project was implemented in March 2008 starting with 20 police stations. The project seeks to strengthen cooperation between the police and public in security matters, help build a professional and accountable police in the state, and enhance the accessibility of the police through close interaction and better understanding of the public. Since its statewide launch, the project has extended to 44 police stations out of a total of 446 throughout the state. The Visiting Programme organized visits in three of the Janamaithri police stations, two in Kochi city and one in Fort Kochi. The project involves two key components: beat patrolling and formation of community policing committees (Janamaithri Suraksha Samithi).

The team visited two Janamaithri stations in Kochi, Kadavanthara and Palarivattom, and one in Fort Kochi. Each of the police stations is divided into beat areas (with each area approximately comprising of 500-1000 houses) under the charge of a Beat Officer belonging to the rank of Assistant Sub-Inspector or Head Constable, and an Assistant Beat Officer, a woman police officer. The Beat Officers are responsible for patrolling, process service, petition enquiry, collection of public complaints and serve as the first contact of the people with the police. The team was shown copies of the Beat register, general diary and the cash register. At Kadavanthara, the team also interacted with the members of the Janamaithri Samithi who shared their experience of working with the police. Particularly noteworthy was the camaraderie between the samithi members and the police, a sign of the confidence and respect the project has been able to generate. Similarly, the Palarivattom station is divided into ten beat areas, and was equally impressive in the facilities provided such as a clean rest room for the night officers, a computer room for data recording, a counseling cell for victims, and a big hall for hosting meetings and discussions.

At Fort Kochi station, the team was introduced to the de-addiction cum counseling center, first of its kind to be opened by the police. The center conducts awareness campaign against tobacco products, provides counseling to family disputes, and shelter to drug addicts. It boasts of having saved seven drug addicted patients and returning them to normal life. In fact, on the day of the visit, a new addict had been brought to the center by his wife. It is unclear what kind of counseling is given, and what ‘return to normal life’ means, but it is certain that such initiatives are bringing about a real shift in the perception of the police as simply a violent force.

Concern was, however, raised over shortage of manpower and resources available for the project. The Sub-Inspector at Fort Kochi pointed out that money is granted by the government only for specific activities and not for the continuous running of the program. Another constrain being faced by the program is lack of participation by local MLAs as a result of which many problems being faced by communities fail to reach policy making level. Despite these constraints, there is a lot of enthusiasm among police officers regarding the project, marking a distinct shift from the general lethargy associated with police officers.

Meeting with Dr B Sandhya, Inspector General of Police, Ernakulam Range, Kerala

The team had a very fruitful discussion with Dr Sandhya who is also the nodal officer of the Janamaithri Suraksha project and who provided a broad overview of the program. In particular, she highlighted the importance of right training for beat officers, and stressed that she personally makes it a point to attend each training session at the Training College, Trivandrum and Kerala Police Academy, Thrissur. One day training is also held for samithi members in order to familiarize them with their role. She also pointed out how the program has not only evoked great interest from the community but increased level of job satisfaction among the junior officers in carrying out their duties. The only problem is that the JS project lacks statutory basis but she was hopeful that it will be included in the draft Kerala Police Bill likely to be passed soon by the state legislature.

Meeting with the Police Complaints Authority (Chiefs)

The meeting with the heads of Police Complaints Authority (Northern district and Southern district) was less encouraging than the Janamaithri visits. Dr DK Wilson, chairman, southern district, pointed out how there were no rules yet for the functioning of the PCAs. Unfortunately, the appointed members of Kerala PCAs also serve as members of the Advisory Board of the Kerala Anti-Social Activities (Prevention) Act, 2007. As a result, they are enormously overburdened and have little resources or time to invest in the PCAs. They also lamented at not being vested with more powers in terms of their recommendations having binding power. As a result, the PCAs have been largely ineffective in Kerala.