IPS leadership must focus on police reforms, not eye positions in other forces

S.K. Sood

The British created the ‘Indian Imperial Police’, (officially known as the Imperial Police or IP) for higher supervisory police administration in the British Raj. The IP was created to ensure uniform system of police administration in British India as mandated by the government of India Act 1858 and Police Act 1861. The service was created to ensure that dangers like the one witnessed by the British during the 1857 Revolution, did not arise again.

Senior leadership of IP was exclusively European till about 1900. The recruitment of IP officers initially was by nomination. However, from 1893 onwards officers were recruited through competitive civil service exams held in London. Indians were not allowed to serve as officers until early 1900s, when the entrance exam was opened for Indians in 1920. By the time India became independent, the ratio of Indians in the officer’s ranks stood at about 30 per cent.

The Imperial Police comprised the Superior Police Services, which is parallel to the present-day Indian Police Service (IPS), and the Subordinate Police Service. The Subordinate Police Service consisted of inspectors, sub-inspectors, head constables (or sergeant in the city forces and cantonments) and constables, consisting mainly of Indians.

In 1948, a year after India’s Independence, the Imperial Police Service was replaced by the Indian Police Service (IPS), which had been constituted as part of the All-India Services by the Constitution.

Article 312 of the Indian Constitution empowers Parliament to create new All-India Services (AIS) common to both the Union and the States, provided the Rajya Sabha passes a resolution with a two-thirds majority declaring that such a service is necessary in the national interest. The rational for the upper house initiating the process through a special majority resolution is that the AIS has to serve both the central and State governments. The Parliament thereafter can pass a law to create the service, regulate recruitment and define service. 

The Indian Administrative Service (IAS), IPS, and Indian Forest Service (IFS) which were existing at the time of adoption of the Constitution are deemed to have been created under this Article.

The Imperial Police was responsible to police the entire British Indian territory including Burma (now Myanmar). The force was frequently utilised to infiltrate and suppress nationalist movements. Imperial Police exercised unprecedented degree of authority within the colonial administration.