Is it humanly possible for a police station in the city, having just 94 police personnel, to conduct effective and timely investigation into 2,200 criminal cases registered during 11 months of this year alone?
Justice A.V. Chandrashekara of the High Court posed this question on analysing the number of cases registered in 105 police stations across the city and their staff strength.
The court had summoned the data of cases registered this year from all 105 police stations after noticing that 2,200 cases were registered at Madiwala station alone in this year. A whopping 9,394 cases were registered in just 13 stations of the south-east division, which has a sanctioned staff strength of only 1,178, of which 272 are vacant.
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“Experience tells us that a police station even with a working strength of 90-100 cannot effectively investigate more than 300 cases in a year,” the court observed while stressing need for having a separate police wing for investigation.
The court said that the authorities and the Home Minister would have to have an expert panel to judge the allocation of work for each police station defining the territorial jurisdiction, staff strength, de-linking investigation from law and order, establishment of a training centre at Bengaluru, and opening new police stations.
If there was no effective investigation, Justice Chandrashekara said that the trial would end with acquittal of the accused. Stating that the analysis was undertaken to bring to the government’s notice the need to initiate steps to enhance the credibility of the police, the court reminded the Home Department of its responsibility of finding reasons for the acquittal of accused while emphasising need for training the investigating officers.