Our Work

Background

Sustainable Development Goal-16 mandates promotion of inclusive institutions, which are effective in dealing with the challenges of violence and are accountable to the people for their safety and security. State Police department was formed in the year 1936, and its manual (OPMR) was unveiled in the year 1940. Since the beginning, police personnel have been taking unprecedented risks, tackling insurgencies, controlling mobs and maintaining law and order. At the same time they blatantly vent their wrath on innocent people and sometime they commit atrocities too. While the nation has evolved through oppressive regime to become a welfare state, the police institutions still continues with the obsolete mechanism crafted by the colonial rulers. Keeping in view directives of Supreme Court to bring reformation in police department, Government of Odisha enacted police bill-2015 to build accountability, transparency and efficiency in the department. But the bill could not bring required improvements as envisaged.

Intervention

• Facilitating involvement of civil societies (community leaders, volunteers, human rights defenders, etc.) with police department for building effectiveness and accountability of the police institutions.
• Creating awareness on responsibilities of police institutions, their role in strengthening rule of law and mitigating suffering of the people.
• CSNR has deepened its engagement with policy makers, Government and human right institutions for effectively monitoring reforms initiatives undertaken. CSNR has organized interfaces between police and communities for building trust and confidence.
• Change agents have been identified in selected police stations to reinforce community oriented policing. Capacity building of police personnel is also carried out to ensure that they remain sensitive to gender issues and are compassionate while discharging their duties.

What has been done so far?

Advocacy campaign was organized for drafting New Police Law as per the Directives of the Supreme Court in 2014-15. A study was conducted during the period April 2015-March 2016 on 21 police stations of Bhubaneswar. On the basis of the study a 'White Paper on the state of crime and Policing in Bhubaneswar’ was released in a workshop of Civil Society Forum on Human Rights on 20th October, 2017 of by CSNR in collaboration with Common Wealth Human Rights Initiative (CHRI. The above study was extended to 3 other districts of Odisha i.e. Cuttack, Jajpur and Kandhamal and was conducted during January 2017-May, 2018. The districts selected for the study was based on criteria “Urban Police District, industrial belt and district affected by communal strife. A State level Convention on "Promotion of Human Rights: Need for Police Reforms" was organized on 30 & 31 March 2017 by Civil Society Forum on Human Rights (CSFHR) and to work out a collective strategy for advocacy campaign with the participation of CSOs, human rights defenders (HRDs), community representatives, academicians, experts, bureaucrats and political activists. A state level CSFHR was formed in the workshop. Number of awareness meetings, workshops, capacity building programmes including ToTs for CSO representatives, HRDs, community leaders and other stakeholders on Police Reform and advocacy for New Police Law at different levels were undertaken. One year after the state level convention of 2017, the participants of the SCFHR Convention strongly urged government to initiate a time bound inclusive process of consultation in the state, to elicit views and opinions of public and civil society towards developing an efficient, responsive, accountable, transparent, professional and unbiased police service in the state, which would able to maintain law and order, prevent and detect crime, ensure environment of peace & security and most importantly act as a ‘service provider’ for all the people by which people can enjoy their constitutional rights to the maximum.”

Accomplishment

• Advocacy campaign was organized for drafting New Police Law as per the Directives of the Supreme Court in 2014-15. A study was conducted during the period April 2015-March 2016 on 21 police stations of Bhubaneswar.
• Consensus was built throughout the state on the urgency of police reform, through in-depth sensitization programs in the four intervened districts.
• The Odisha Police Bill-2015 was sent back by the Governor for review and to make improvement in the lines of the SC Directives.
• The study report on "The state of crime and policing in Odisha", based on its study in Bhubaneswar, Cuttack, Jajpur and Kandhamal both in English and Odiya has been published, this has generated public discourse on the policing.

Current Engagement

• Awareness meetings, workshops and dialogue with police and communities on rules and regulations of policing is continuous, Police station officials in three selected districts i.e. Khurdha, Kandhamal and Sundargarh are oriented to remain proactive while maintaining rapport with communities.
• Dialogue between CSFHR, community representatives, change agents and HRDs with the officials of government departments, Police & human rights institutions and the policy makers from the district to the state level remain on continuous basis.

Ways Ahead

• To continue awareness meetings, workshops, capacity building programmes for different stakeholders on Police Reform and Advocacy for New Police Law as well as to promote community oriented policing and community observers to monitor the functioning of Police and Police Stations.
• To hold dialogues with policy makers, legislators, bureaucrats representatives of political parties and develop resource kits for Media and others.
• To facilitate processes of dialogues between with police and communities on rules and regulations of policing and sensitize Police Station Officials in three selected districts i.e. Khurdha, Kandhamal and Sundargarh.
• To study and document the cases of human rights violations including illegal arrest & detention, custodial torture of HRDs, advocacy and legal intervention for justice with Fact-finding visits and engagement with Statutory State Human Rights Institutions.