Police system

1. Background: indigenous institutions and early Company rule

Before British consolidation, policing was distributed among several authorities rather than organised as a uniform territorial service. Under the Mughals, the kotwal supervised urban order, markets and aspects of municipal regulation, while the faujdar exercised military and policing responsibilities over a wider jurisdiction. Village headmen, watchmen and local landholders assisted in detecting offences and securing routes. Arrangements differed considerably across regions; pre-colonial India did not possess a single police system comparable to the later provincial constabulary.

After acquiring the diwani of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa in 1765, the East India Company faced the interconnected problems of revenue collection, rural disorder and criminal justice. It initially relied heavily on existing intermediaries. Zamindars and their establishments performed policing functions, but Company officials increasingly viewed them as unreliable, interested parties who might conceal crimes or shelter offenders. The emergence of colonial policing was therefore linked to the Company’s effort to replace intermediary authority with direct territorial administration.

This transition was neither immediate nor complete. Village watchmen and informants remained indispensable because officials lacked local knowledge and adequate personnel. A recurring feature of colonial policing was thus the combination of a centralised chain of command with dependence on locally embedded intermediaries.

2. Cornwallis and the daroga system

Cornwallis’s reforms in Bengal in 1793 marked a major step towards a state-controlled police establishment. Districts were divided into police jurisdictions centred on thanas, each headed by a salaried daroga. The daroga worked under the supervision of the district magistrate. Zamindars were formally relieved of their principal policing responsibilities, although local landed influence and village-level arrangements continued in practice. The reforms belonged to the broader administrative and judicial restructuring associated with the Cornwallis Code.

The intention was to make policing answerable to Company officials rather than to revenue intermediaries. However, a police station often covered a large area with inadequate staff and poor communications. Darogas depended on subordinate personnel, village watchmen and informants. Low remuneration, weak supervision and opportunities for extracting illegal payments contributed to corruption and coercion. Complainants could face demands for money, while suspects and witnesses were vulnerable to intimidation.

The system also reflected colonial racial hierarchy. Indians generally occupied subordinate positions, while senior supervision rested with European officials. Reforms varied across presidencies, and later experiments included more disciplined, military-style organisations. Charles Napier’s policing arrangements in Sind after its conquest in 1843 are commonly identified as an important precursor to the constabulary model. For examinations, distinguish the Cornwallis-era daroga system from the later province-wide hierarchy established under the 1861 legislation.

3. The Police Act, 1861: structure and powers

The Revolt of 1857 exposed weaknesses in colonial intelligence and internal security. After power passed from the Company to the Crown in 1858, the government appointed a Police Commission in 1860. Its recommendations informed the Police Act, 1861, which sought a more efficient and disciplined police organisation. Although legally distinct from the army, the force adopted a strongly hierarchical structure and an emphasis on obedience. Securing the colonial state, rather than establishing democratic accountability, shaped its institutional priorities.

The Act placed the superintendence of police in the provincial government and police administration under an inspector-general and subordinate officers. At district level, the district superintendent administered the force under the general control and direction of the district magistrate. This arrangement joined professional police leadership to executive-magisterial oversight. It should not be confused with police independence from the executive or with control by the judiciary.

Section 23 listed duties including collecting intelligence affecting public peace, preventing offences and public nuisances, detecting offenders and bringing them to justice. The Act also provided for regulation of public assemblies and processions. Additional police could be stationed in specified circumstances, with costs recoverable locally under statutory provisions. The Code of Criminal Procedure, 1898 subsequently supplied an important procedural framework for investigation and criminal proceedings. Police laws and arrangements nevertheless differed across provinces and presidency towns; the 1861 Act should not be treated as the only policing law operating throughout British India.

4. Curzon, professionalisation and political surveillance

Lord Curzon appointed the Indian Police Commission in 1902 under Andrew Fraser; its report appeared in 1903. The Commission strongly criticised the force’s inadequate training, poor organisation, corruption and oppressive conduct. Its recommendations addressed recruitment, pay, training, supervision and investigative capacity. It also favoured strengthening provincial criminal investigation arrangements. These recommendations contributed to the establishment of Criminal Investigation Departments in the provinces, generally from 1905 onward.

Professionalisation included improved crime records, identification techniques, communications and specialised investigation. British India became an early centre of fingerprint-based identification. A fingerprint bureau was established in Calcutta in 1897. Indian experts Azizul Haque and Hem Chandra Bose made important contributions to the classification system associated with Edward Henry. Such innovations demonstrate that the history of colonial policing involved technical development as well as coercion.

Criminal investigation and political intelligence overlapped but were not identical. With the growth of nationalism, police increasingly monitored newspapers, meetings, political associations and revolutionary organisations. During the Swadeshi movement after the partition of Bengal in 1905, surveillance and restrictions on gatherings became major instruments of government. Administrative improvements therefore expanded the capacity to investigate ordinary crime while also strengthening the machinery used to contain anti-colonial mobilisation.

5. Social impact, nationalist criticism and institutional legacy

Colonial policing was closely connected with the protection of revenue, property and official authority. Its burdens fell unevenly on peasants, workers and marginalised communities. The Criminal Tribes Act, 1871 and later enactments subjected notified communities to registration, surveillance and restrictions on movement. This institutionalised collective suspicion based on community identity rather than individual culpability. The term criminal tribe is a historical legal label, not a valid description of any community.

Nationalists criticised arbitrary arrests, coercive interrogation, intrusive surveillance and police violence. Nevertheless, police activity cannot be reduced entirely to political repression: the force also investigated theft, homicide and other ordinary offences. The central historical issue is that these public-order functions operated within an unrepresentative state whose coercive institutions were primarily accountable upward to colonial officials.

After independence, constitutional democracy transformed the normative basis of policing. Public order and police became State List subjects under Entries 1 and 2 respectively. Yet many states retained the 1861 legislation or inherited organisational practices. The Supreme Court’s directions in Prakash Singh v. Union of India in 2006 addressed issues such as tenure security, complaints authorities and separation of investigation from law-and-order duties. This provides a useful contemporary link, but those directions must not be confused with colonial-era reforms.

Previous year questions

No UPSC question has been asked directly on this micro-topic yet. Use the practice questions below.

Practice questions