CROWD control in India has become increasingly complex, and the complexity sometimes owes to our polity.
While developed nations, such as the UK and Scandinavian countries, have long back evolved their non-lethal methods to control crowd and angry people, the political system of India has not preferred to look into the nature and content of the restive crowd and instead continues to treat people agitating for or against something as dangerous animals. Which is why social tensions, religious disputes, economic struggles and regional, linguistic and ethnic protests are not being treated as reflection of the popular grievances of the people; instead these are perceived as a challenge to the state. Naturally so far the issue of using non-lethal mechanism to control the crowd never engaged the politicians and polity in a serious manner.
The Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh’s initiative on non-lethal approach to Kashmir protests is welcome. He has felt the need for revisiting the standard operating procedures and crowd control measures to deal with public agitation with non-lethal, yet effective and focused measures. Dr Singh is forced to think with nearly 60 civilians dying in Kashmir within a month. At a meeting of the state DGPs he also advocated measures which would control mobs without causing deaths.
It is imperative to know and assess the crowd behaviour for effective crowd control. There is little doubt that the law enforcement concepts on crowd control are based on stereotypes. The government or for that matter the police ought to realise that crowds are not homogeneous entities; participants are not the same and the crowds are not made up of isolated individuals. Often they do not have unanimous motives. This is the reason that while a section of the crowd demonstrates in a peaceful manner, a group of the same crowd indulges in arson. In fact the social, political and economic factors are not consistent predictors of riot intensity. Crowd is basically a gathering of individuals and small groups that have temporarily assembled.
It would do well to remember that all crowds in Kashmir were not instigated and used by separatists to further their nefarious designs. No doubt the presence of fundamentalists and non-state actors had complicated the scene. But this should have been taken as a real test for policing acumen; the state police should have shown greater vigilance and coordination. The law enforcement agencies should have given a serious thought to their mechanism to crowd control. Nevertheless what has happened in the past should be used to evolve a new non-lethal mechanism to control crowd.
Dr Singh has instructed the Union Home Minister, Mr P Chidambaram to set up a high-powered task force to make a set of recommendations on non-lethal crowd control measures in three months. The task force should look into the measures and crowd control procedures that other countries have put in place. But what is also needed is the government must liberate the police from the grip of the politicians. The Rapid Action Force is an instrument for non-lethal crowd control. But the fact is it has to take command from the local police. While directing the police to follow non-lethal techniques for policing and crowd control the government has to ensure that the ordinary policeman is fully equipped with protective gears. At least 1,200 policemen were hurt in Kashmir in mob violence. If the model can be successful in foreign countries there is no reason why should not it succeed in India.
