SC hears plea for transparent recruitment of policemen

The Supreme Court Monday issued notice to the Centre and the states on a petition seeking a transparent recruitment process (TRP) in police constabularies in the states which is generally mired in allegations of wrongdoing and bribery.

The bench of Justice T.S. Thakur, Justice Adarsh Kumar Goel and Justice R. Bhanumathi issued notice on NGO Lokniti Foundation's plea for direction to the Centre and the states to "adopt and implement the TRP, developed and recommended by the National Police Mission" for the "recruitment (of) police personnel... and to modify the relevant police recruitment/service rules".

The petition said "a police personnel who has been recruited on the basis of payment of a bribe will naturally like to immediately recover the price paid by him at the time of his selection, by resorting to corrupt and illegal means".

"A person who enters the police force through corrupt means cannot be expected to perform his duties of maintenance of law and order and detection of crime in a fair and just manner irrespective of all other qualities and capabilities," the petition said.

Counsel Ashok Dhamija, appearing for the NGO, said that on Jan 1, 2009, there were about 530,580 vacancies of constables in various states as against the total sanctioned strength of about 20,56,041 posts. This was about 25 percent of the total police personnel.

Dhamija said that even on Jan 1, 2013, there were about 5,48,361 police posts lying vacant out of the total police strength of about 22,09,027, which again amounts to about 25 percent vacancies.

The petition seeking TRP was filed in 2010 and got tagged with the larger issue of police reforms that is being dealt by the apex court seeking to separate law and order from investigation and fixed tenure for police officers and insulating them from political pressure and machination.

After issuance of the notice, counsel Dhamija said the petition focuses on the recruitment of police constables, which is generally mired in controversies and allegations of corruption, nepotism, partiality, political interference and bias in various states.

He said many recruitment scams have come to light, including some before the courts, while many others remain hidden from public glare.

Dhamija said the objective of the petition was early implementation of the TRP by the states and union territories.

The TRP, he said, was developed to ensure police recruitment was "tamper-proof, fair and transparent, and that recruits candidates objectively on the principle of meritorious selection with the help of well-defined procedures and the use of technology, and not on the basis of any extraneous considerations, whatsoever".