'The devil must be given his due'

Prof Deven Dutta lauds Assam Police for success in maintaining peace

BY OUR STAFF REPORTER 

GUWAHATI, Aug 16: Public activist Professor Deven Dutta has lauded the role of the Assam Police for its success in maintaining “peace though for whatever its worth,” as he says, by containing extremist activities including several possible and imminent sabotaging and subversive incidents planned by extremists and fundamentalist elements. 

Prof Dutta who has been severely critical about Assam Police force over a long period of time,  said that there was a time when the common people had full confidence with  this force under the Home Department generally sympathized and identified with it.  In fact during the Bordoloi Trophy and the Independence Day Cup football matches, by and large most spectators had stood in support of the Assam Police team with thundershowers claps and cheers. But with increasing politicization and so called “political” interference in the day to day affairs and functioning of the Force by petty polilickers and their camp roaders over the years, resulting in growing anti-people activities including extortion and various immoral activities by policemen of various ranks, the people started losing confidence in them.

Refusing to recognize the overwhelming majority of the people in today’s political filed of Assam as politician, and “far less as statesmen” , professor Dutta said that tremendous shortage of police personnel like constables, havilders, ASIs, SIs , dillydallying and crimil delay in appointments, spine-chilling corruption in appointments in the past, failure to take action against guilty persons like Dulal Bora in the Assam Police Battellion at Titabor years ago, attaching large numbers of police personnel as security personnel to so called VIPs like ministers , bureaucrats, top police officials and surrendered extremists masquerading  as “political liberators”,  have completely broken the backbone of once glorious Assam Police  and demoralized them even demeaned them in the eyes of the people even encouraging utter crimils and law breakers to physically assault them in discharge of their official and professiol duties as in recent cases like procession by Bolle Bowm devotees and dragging out from police vehicles men declared by judiciary as foreign tiol by openly beating police officers. Thieves, robbers , common goons, murders and rapists arrested by dutiful policemen have to be released due to “unwritten orders / verbal pressures” by higher ups. Corruption among the policemen is the direct outcome of corruption at the  “pseudo political level”. As the Assamese saying goes,—“a fish starts rotting from its head”.

Prof Dutta said against such a reprehensible backdrop, and with tremendous shortage of personnel and modern weaponry to tackle dangerous law-breakers and pseudo political extremists and even logistics to control traffic jams particularly caused by commercial vehicles and bikers and with famine of political backing, the Assam Police have done a commendable job during the last few days. He said that the devil must be given his due and, given adequate personnel and proper implementation of the recommendations of the Police Accountability Commission and a free hand in professiol discharge of duties, the Assam Police will soon regain its lost glory  of yore.