Normally, the arrest of Nepali Yadav by a team of Gaya policemen from the city would have been a routine case of coordination between two state police authorities. But this time, there has occurred a controversy instead: the visiting team did its work without informing their Kolkata counterparts.

To add insult to the injury, when West Bengal authorities took up the matter with Bihar, they were told that giving prior intimation about the matter could have resulted in a leakage of information, which Patna wanted to avoid at all costs. Yadav was wanted in connection with several cases in Bihar and was putting up in a central Kolkata guesthouse when he was nabbed. Kolkata police sources, who had no prior intimation or intelligence about his presence, later took the line that the person was” not a major criminal.”

Thoroughly miffed, Kolkata police sources have questioned the very legality of the action taken by the Gaya policemen. In any case, it is very much the “done” thing among state police forces to keep each other informed about the activities in inter-state criminals who are active in the region as a whole.

It is not the first time that police authorities of other States have by-passed West Bengal and Kolkata police in their operations, which have spilled over into the State. Once in the nineties, a team of Punjab policemen carried out an encounter, killing five wanted people within the city. On another occasion, policemen from Uttar Pradesh made several arrests from the city.

As with Yadav, whom the Bihar police took back to Gaya, the police took away those arrested to Uttar Pradesh to face charges pending against them there. At no time they deigned to discuss their action or plans with their state counterparts.

The lack of confidence in the state police, once regarded as a crack force in India, is not restricted among other states in India. Bangladesh authorities still bitterly rue their tip off to West Bengal police about one Risaldar Mosleuddin, who was among the killers of the late Prime Minister and founder of Bangladesh, Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, some years ago. When a state police team accompanied a Bangladesh police party went to the Murshidabad hideout of Mosleuddin, he had gone missing! He had been traced after years of patient and painstaking investigation by Bangladesh police who were naturally cut up over all their good work going to waste through what was obviously a leak that occurred in West Bengal!

There is no doubt that increasing politicisation and even active interference with routine police work such as investigation and law and order maintenance, especially under the Left front, has contributed to a shocking decline of efficiency and effectiveness of the force in West Bengal. Under the Left, officers heading local thanas were required to do the bidding of local committee members and others of the CPI(M). Favouritism in posting became a routine affair directed from the state Secretariat.

Sadly it has been no different under the Trinamool Congress (TMC) rule, after May 2011. If anything, matters have worsened, as evident from the reluctance of the police to draw up effective charge sheets against criminals in murder cases, if they enjoy political patronage. This despite the testimony of eye-witness accounts, which are ignored.

It was with the utmost reluctance that the police arrested Mohammad Iqbal alias Munna, after the murder of a police officer over student elections in a Garden reach college. The reason: he belonged to the ruling party. Similarly, another accused was arrested from a neighbouring state following the murder of a fellow TMC leader in another area, after he was apparently allowed to escape.

The other area where the state police fall woefully short of minimal efficiency is the solution of cases and the conviction of criminals. Even for serious crimes like murder, the conviction rate in the state is below 20% whereas it is nearly double in Bihar or Jharkhand and close to 60% in other states (Percentages approx), according to crime statistics collected nationally. The position looked so embarrassing for the state that under TMC rule, the state government has stopped reporting its crime figures to the centre - a truly sad commentary on the law and order situation and the state of governance. (IPA Service)