63,000 complaints against cops and number rising

New Delhi: The Police in India, also the guardians of law are now often found on the wrong side of the law.

The National Crime Records Bureau reports 62,822 complaints were filed against policemen across the country in 2006 and cases were registered in 13,546 of them and the figure has just increased during the last two-years.

Two policemen were sacked in Haryana after a woman committed suicide at a Haryana police station because the two policemen allegedly raped her and slapped false charges of theft on her husband. It is only after her death that an inquiry was ordered.

From the Noida double murder to inefficient investigations of bomb blasts, the police seem to be fast losing public trust and confidence.

The question that many ask is whether the policemen are increasingly forgetting their responsibilities or more importantly are they crossing the limits of law too often?

On June 9, 2008, two Punjab police constables in uniform create a spectacle in Jalandhar after getting drunk. The two do the bhangra, harass women, and chase each other and one of them even falls into a ditch.

On May 23, 2008, as the country shared the shock and horror of Aarushi Talwar's murder, police made one reckless statement after another.

The irresponsible statements saying that Arushi was with Hemraj in an ‘objectionable, though not compromising position’ and a shoddy investigation lead to the transfer of three senior UP police officials.

In March 2008, Senior IPS officer RK Sharma was sentenced to life imprisonment by a Delhi court in the sensational Shivani Bhatnagar murder case. Sharma had hired killers to murder Bhatnagar, a journalist he was close to.

A year ago in October 2007, a Delhi court awarded life term to suspended ACP SS Rathi and nine other policemen, convicted of killing two innocent businessmen, both unarmed, in a fake encounter at Connaught Place in Delhi.

A constable, Sunil Atmaram More raped a 16-year old at Mumbai's Marine Drive police station in May 2005. He was later sentenced to 12-years of rigorous imprisonment.

Crime by policemen is on a rise and it seems public is losing its confidence in the guardians of law.