Last month, the BWSC Editor
received an email from someone in the private sector raising an oft-debated and interesting issue: the role of private security personnel in policing. It was an interesting argument that piqued our interest and merited a follow up, in light of a lot of talk on PPPs, safer cities and India's transformational journey of doing things differently with greater private sector involvement.
Excerpts: "India has a huge number of private security personnel who if trained and motivated well can extend their support to the Police and int agencies in identification of deviant behaviour to enable them to contain the same before it creates chaos and violence...Imagine an army of 5 million private security personnel acting as eyes and ears of the law enforcement and int agencies"
We requested a recently-retired senior police officer to share his thoughts.
In short, here is what he had to say:
MY TAKE
The idea of using employees of private security agencies to act as adjuncts of police and intelligence agencies is laudable but difficult to implement in India. This is because most of these employees do not have adequate education and have also not undergone any training worth the name before being asked to don their uniform and perform security duties.
The legal framework for functioning of security agencies in our country is provided by The Private Security Agencies ( Regulation) Act, 2005, at the national level, and The Private Security Agencies ( Regulation) Rules of various states/union territories (UTs) at the state level. Both the Act and the Rules do not lay down any minimum educational qualification for a person to act as security guard. So, legally, even an illiterate can function as a security guard as long as he meets the physical standards laid down. Further the 'Competent Authority' laid down under the Act to regulate security agencies are invariably babus who have no domain expertise or specialised knowledge. The absence of education and lack of training makes these security agency employees unsuitable for higher responsibilities.
Further, security agency jobs are considered as low-end, minimum wage ones with hardly any future prospects for promotion, increment and skill enhancement. Many of the employees have had to pay middlemen to get even these basic jobs. The security agencies deduct the money due to these middlemen before paying the wages. Given the meagre pay and dismal prospects most employees are a disinterested lot. However the raw material is good and most employees are punctual, alert and observant. They could be of far greater use to society and the nation if they were better motivated and trained.
Ironically, better trained and motivated volunteers are already available in the form of Home Guards and Civil Defence volunteers all over the country. Every state maintains on its rolls thousands of Home Guards and Civil Defence volunteers who have undergone a minimum of 6 weeks training. They have also been trained in First Aid, disaster relief and rescue, etc. All states also have armed Home Guards who have been trained in the use, and handling, of weapons. Although both Home Guards and Civil Defence volunteers are meant to be totally voluntary organisations but, given the lack of employment opportunities, these ‘volunteers’ would be all too keen to get some kind of jobs.
Another advantage that these volunteers have is that they are already being used by the police, on occasion, for traffic management , law and order duty, elections, disaster relief, etc. hence they have a much better working relationship with the police. In my view, it would be much better to utilise the existing Home Guards and Civil Defence volunteers to act as eyes and ears of the police and intelligence agencies as they are verified, much better trained and motivated. Security agency employees will have to have better education and far better training before they can fit into this role.
