2-Day workshop on "Leadership for managing change and transition" held at Jammu and Kashmir Police Headquarters, Srinagar.

Dr. Abhijit Gangopadhyay, Prof. and Head Department of Management and Industrial Relations, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai participating in the deliberations
 

Mission

Our mission is to restore complete peace and normalcy in the State of Jammu and Kashmir so that every member of the society without exception lives a peaceful life, with rights secured and protected, free from fear and violence. For this, we have to prepare the members of Jammu and Kashmir Police and undertake the urgent actions that are necessary to instilling core values of excellence in service delivery, respect for human rights, pride, dedication and devotion towards duty, Force and the nation.

J&K Police

As the society changes, so does its type of crime. Whether it is crime against person or property, computer-facilitated or white-collar crime, significant changes do occur in the nature and dynamics of these crime problems. As any legitimate business organization does everything possible to stay profitable, organized-crime groups do adept their activities to the changing environment and, thus, new patterns of crime and criminality do surface.

The problems of increased pace of urbanization and industrialization, declining standards of morality and degeneration of ethical values and increasing materialism are not new but they are more widespread and profoundly entrenched in the society than they were even a decade ago. Interwoven and reinforcing, they feed off one another and abrogate the rights of all sections of the society in compounding ways with each day passing by. Intergenerational patterns of poverty and greed, violence and conflict are at an increase. For this reason, the implications of the changing trends in the society indicate major dimensions in crime and criminality including cross- border terrorism, social disorders, juvenile delinquencies, caste and communal violence, smuggling and espionage activities and cyber crimes etc, which shall not only multiply the duties and responsibilities but also pose innumerable challenges to the police.

The future challenges eloquently tell us not to confine our preparedness and the capacity to the traditional role of enforcing law and order but to keep on increasing our professional efficiency to respond effectively to the complexity of problems in the changing situation.

Assessing the situations in advance, identifying and defining the future challenges and evolving means for preparing a professional, forward looking, contemporary and competent police force assumes significant importance for meeting these challenges and maintaining a good fit between the changing environment and police.

With this thing in mind, a 2-Day workshop on "Leadership for managing change and transition" was held in Police Headquarters, Srinagar, which ended with the premise that the Police organization needs to delineate a focused approach and redefine its role and responsibilities in the wake of societal dispensations. Police, which holds the most sacred trust of keeping the peace in the society, has to direct its efforts towards those points where the potential for the change and impact will be greatest. That is where the vision begins.

The "Vision Statement-2010" is a call to all Police officers and men to realize that there is no duty more important than ensuring that the welfare of the people is supreme, that their life and property is safeguarded and they grow up in peace, and the police is bound to discharge its constitutional and legal duties with commitment, imagination, diligence and compassion.

Our contemporary society is passing through a phase of transition from tradition to modernity. Times have changed, so have systems, people and the society. In the continuing process of change, some most dramatic and significant gains in social development are quite visible but, at the same time, the social scene is also dominated by upheavals and complexities in crime and criminality. Serious crimes directed at the members of the society including hijacking dramas, kidnappings for ransom, sexual violence against women and children, rampant corruption, growth of cyber crimes etc. are on the steady increase. Although, in the recent years, there has been a decline in systematic slaughter of civilians by the terrorists, extremists and anti-social elements, yet we have not overcome the problem fully.

There is no trust more sacred than the one the society holds with the police. To meet the moral and legal obligation of maintaining law and order, we need to identify and analyse the emerging issues and envision the future course of action in consonance with the complex environment of the structural changes in society and spurts in criminal activities. Better management of police organization, competence building by improving knowledge and skills, developing right attitudes, beliefs, behavioural changes and better equipment for effective performance are highly imperative for meeting the needs and demands of the changing dynamics of the social system.

The police organization is functioning under the Police Act given by the British imperialists, drafted way back in 1861. There is a dire need of redefining the role, structure and functions of Police to make it compatible with the needs of the democratic polity and accountable to the law of the land and society.

J&K Police, under the leadership of Shri Gopal Sharma, Director General of Police, while sharing the belief that human progress and overall development of the society lie in maintaining peace and order, has been striving to be true to its moral and legal obligations. Directing its efforts towards this, a 2-day workshop was held to examine its charter of duties and responsibilities in the wake of emerging societal dispensation for envisioning the future course of action. This "Vision Statement-2010" was unanimously adopted during the 2-day workshop for senior police officers of J&K on "Leadership for managing change and transition", held in the Police Headquarters at Srinagar on July 19-20, 2004.

Dr. Abhijit Gangopadhyay, Prof. and Head Department of Management and Industrial Relations, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, Dr. Ashok Aima, Professor, Department of Management Studies, University of Jammu, Dr. Meenakshi Kalim Oswal, Reader, Department of Management Studies, University of Jammu and Dr. Musadiq Amin Sahaf, senior Reader, Department of Management Studies, University of Kashmir, who responded generously to our request in attending and lending expert advice during the deliberations of the 2-day workshop deserve our gratitude. I am especially thankful to Dr. Ashok Aima, Professor, Department of Management Studies, University of Jammu, for his expert guidance in preparing the "Vision Statement-2010".

I thank the officers of J&K Police who took keen interest in making the conference a success through their active participation in the deliberations. I would also like to thank Shri M.A. Anjum, DIG, Armed Range, Jammu, nodal officer, Shri Syed Ahmed Syed, Commandant JKAP-5th battalion, Shri Manohar Singh, SP, Shri G. M. Dar, Commandant IRP-6th battalion, Shri P. N. Pandita, Dy.S.P, PHQ and Shri Surinder Mahaldar, Dy.SP, who worked together every thing to precision for the successful conduct of the conference and in preparing the "Vision Statement-2010".

Introduction

Every organization needs to have a guiding philosophy, clear and passionate about what needs to be done so that it is neither cowed nor intimidated by the challenges ahead that is where the vision begins. It then permeates an organization its decisions, its policies, its actions throughout all the phases of organization's evolution. The guiding philosophy is a system of fundamental motivating assumptions, principles, values and tenets, analogous to the philosophy of life of an individual. There has to be a proper alignment of an individual's life with the organization's life to develop mutuality stakes and purpose of action. To become a visionary organization, the guiding philosophy must be institutionalized so that the philosophy becomes identified primarily with the organization, rather than with certain individuals running and controlling the organization, thereby helping it to evolve in to an enduring, self-renewing institution. Posterity eventually judges individuals and the organizations in reference to their relevance to the societal needs, aspirations and expectations.

Statement of the problem:

Massive politico-economic changes are occurring at the national and global level. This has generated societal upheavals and complexities. Humanity has seen stunning advances and has made enormous strides in the environment of technical advancements, systemic and structural changes in society and spurts in criminal and terrorist activities, which, in turn, have posed numerous challenges to law and order machinery.

Police has been experiencing exponential expansion of its role in every sphere of human activity, many of them in the last few decades, many others in just over the span of a generation. The wide use of the police in the vast spectrum of the civilian life and state governance has brought about a multi-tasking work orientation in the state police force. The transformation has blunted the effectiveness of the police in handling

its cardinal duties of providing security, maintenance of order and investigation of crimes. In the light of the prevailing situation in the state, combating cross-border and narco-terrorism, preventing and repulsing fidayeen (suicidal) attacks and cyber crimes and white-collar crimes have been added to the long list of police duties. Policing is presently seen as an un-intellectual exercise with a flare for brawn, ruthlessness and daring-do, not for no reason.

The changing situation is likely to create future complex societal network, which would provide breeding ground for complicated criminal activities warranting skilled and intelligent policing.

THIS GIVES AN URGENT CALL TO POLICE LEADERSHIP TO IDENTIFY THE INITIATIVES FOR ROAD MAPPING THE FUTURE STEPS AND TO DESIGN NEW COURSE OF ACTION FOR MANAGING SOCIETAL CHANGE AND TRANSITION TO DIRECT, GUIDE AND CONTROL FOR OBTAINING THE WILLING OBEDIENCE, CONFIDENCE, RESPECT AND COOPERATION OF THE MEN THEY COMMAND IN THE ACCOMPLISHMENT OF THE OBJECTIVES TO BUILD ON ITS STRENGTHS AND OVERCOME THE WEAKNESSES FOR KEEPING PEACE AND ORDER IN THE SOCIETY.

• It is essential for the police, which have a direct contact and interface with the masses, to re-examine its charter of duties and responsibilities in the wake of emerging societal dispensation, for redefining its role and purpose. In order to roadmap a future agenda, police organization of the state needs to analyse emerging issues and perspectives before envisioning the future course of action.

• The police, as the custodians of law and order in the society, have to move with a new vision and focus on proficient handling of the emerging situation. Police no longer can now confine its preparedness and the capacity to the traditional role of enforcing law and order and respond to such challenges on the premise as were in vogue over the span of a generation. Assessment of situations ahead, defining the future challenges and evolving means to neutralize them in advance form the basic tenets of good policing and are sine-qua-non with the territorial integrity of the country and the welfare of the its citizens. The cardinal approach of future policing has to be through proficient performance with minimal visible presence. This means a far more professional orientation of the force on the ground than ever before. This means far more skilled policing; better management of the police organization; better-equipped force, and contented men, manning the police hierarchy, that are of higher calibre.

The present Focus:

• The Police have to be manned by highly motivated personnel, willing to be determined to meet challenges and show substantive results. The desired improvisation in the quality of policing will bring much needed respect to the job and people will start seeing in police their friends.

• An overhaul of selection and training policies is urgently required to infuse and build up mental and intellectual competencies in the police force so that it is able to become the bedrock of the societal governance, besides leading to the organizational empowerment.

• The professional image of the police as a handmaid of the political bosses needs to be radically changed to pro-masses. What is required is a perspicacious definition of police duties and responsibilities and empowering the force to perform the duties under the watchful eyes of the constitution without distractions and nefarious designs. The police should have free hand to tackle and solve issues cropping up during the process of policing with concomitant responsibility for any failures squarely lying on its shoulders.

• Hi-tech policing is another imperative. Police cannot afford to lose ground to criminals in the field of hi-tech. Efficiency of policing is pro-rata to competence to perform in a given situation in meeting the challenges. The competence necessarily implies moving pari passu with the fast changing hi-tech environment in the fields of transport, communication and weaponry and detection system.

WE HAVE TO IDENTIFY THE GOALS FOR EXCELLENCE IN POLICE PROFESSION AND DEVISE MEASURES TO REMOVE HURDLES IN THE WAY. WE HAVE TO BELIEVE IN OURSELVES THAT WE ARE IN A POSITION TO ACHIEVE AND WE WILL.

The Future Issues and Perspectives:

• Policing methods and ideas have remained, by and large, stagnant over the decades and generations. Not much has been done in the field of criminal investigation on modern and scientific lines. Use of third degree methods in interrogations have sullied the image of the police in a century which brought revolutionary changes in the concepts of human dignity, equality, justice for all and basic human rights. Human rights violations remained a major problem on the policing process especially in militancy infested areas. There is need to build human rights into police ethos and the accountability and representative ness should be among the features of policing. The issues of human rights is being used as an instrument of state policy in a twisted manner and applied in order to further the country's interest in a given situation and have become a political weapon to attack an adversary rather than a liberal concept to uphold the dignity of man. This has further compounded the problems of the police, but it, in any case, has to ensure that the organizational culture and values do not eulogize illegal actions.

• Crime is the symptom of a problem and not the entirety of the problem, we all must realize this. We have to help the people to solve the problem, which is the essence of the Community policing. The community policing requires developing conflict resolution skills in police. Police as enforcers of the social legislations, outside the conventional area of crime and order, need to reach out to such silent areas as are likely to precipitate into crimes, and tackle the problem in advance. The huge social legislations and the task of enforcing them demand creating a separate community police wing out of the present police. This measure will relieve the body police from lot of work-pressures and provide it required time and energy to concentrate on vital issues of the general policing.

• Another crucial task ahead is to bring about paradigm changes in the investigating responsibilities and the prosecution duties to a single whole. The police will need prompt responses and quick decisions visa- a- vis the complex nature of emerging crimes.

• The key to the success of the police is its response time, the speed with which it responds to the challenges of the crime. Where time is a precious commodity and a difference of a couple of seconds make the difference of success and failure of a police operation, persistent efforts to shorten response time should get the highest priority. The thrust of the police administration of the present millennium has to be directed to bettering the response time, as speed will be the mainstay of crimes and criminals of the coming age. Short response time implies improved communication and transport network and highly motivated human resources ever ready to handle challenges. In the present millennium, police force has to emerge in the finest fettle in terms of organization, manpower and equipments and becoming a highly organized efficient arm of the state apparatus.

• The police are required to shed its colonial legacy of using muscle power by showing its strength in lieu of efficient policing. The stress in future will be on lean and fit policing. The structural deformity and overweight caused by redundant posts, undefined jobs, lack of accountability, episodic equation of rights and responsibilities, top-heavy structure, erratic span of control, demotivating factors, non-professional ambience and uninspiring leadership has to become a matter of the past for retaining its relevance to the expectations of the society.

• Going hi-tech: The investigation process would now expand the horizons of science and technology rather than the other way round. Gene tests will become a strategic and commonly employed tool of investigation against crimes relating to bodily harm, paternity and even bodily associations. Laser guns will come handy in handling violent law and order issues. Night-vision instruments will become an essential part of the investigation and security operations kits to be handled by every police officer. The age may see police using eavesdropping instruments to overhear unsuspecting people from distance. "X-ray eyes' aid viewing across walls or closed doors. Computers will become an integral part of the routine as well as special police works and police stations. Police may see software devised to guide investigating officers in investigating every kind of crime at every level. Helicopters and mini aeroplanes will become common mode of transportation for carrying investigating teams, deployment of security staff, airlifting armed forces to disturbed places as time becomes precious and criminals become ingenious in dodging the police.

• An important future option to be identified is police becoming an elite force with even its bottom levels being manned by highly qualified, skilled and enlightened professionals. Constabulary will have to be spruced to striking forces. With it, may go the pernicious misuse of the constabulary as household assistants. Single-point recruitment needs to come to vogue with linear promotions from the lowest to the highest ranks based on merit and actual performances in the field as assessed by a panel of distinguished public figures, constituted for the purpose.

• A cost-efficient work force policy in future police administration has to bring about the necessary motivation and commitment in centre-stage. The present tendency of doing minimum required in a given situation, unless otherwise compelled by the situation, amounts to criminal omission of duties. The emerging societal changes require every single policeman straining his best with a sense of motivation and commitment in the interests of superior policing. Police planners have no alternatives but to groom the police man-power to the level of self-respect and actualization, which enjoys wide public acclaim. This means good living conditions, positive change in police image and social status. The police must find a respectable place in the hierarchy of state administration and shed away image of odd-job-man of the government as well as political leaders to inspire awe and respect. The transformation is sine-qua -non with the new age.

•  Creating self-contained police machinery in place of the present mere nuts and bolts of the administration is the cardinal need ahead. The unwanted political and bureaucratic interferences in professional policing have done no good to the country and its police in the last five decades. This is possible only by the metamorphosis of the police to an independent body with goals and objectives perspicuously defined and laid down. The police will have to be responsible only to the constitution through suitable machinery of checks and counterchecks exercised by constitutional bodies manned by people of proven record of accomplishment in matters of integrity, competence and other mental attributes and chosen from academic, bureaucratic and political fields as well as public life. The change can bring a semblance of justice and infuse a value system, which envisages strict adherence to probity and the rule of law in public life.

SWOT analysis of Jammu and Kashmir Police during the 2-day Brain-storming Session of the workshop

The participants of the Workshop, devided into groups held a SWOT analysis of J&K Police during the 2-day brain-storming session.

Group 1 : Shri P.S.Gill, IPS, Shri Ram Lubhaya, IPS, Shri Raja Aijaz Ali, IPS and Shri A.S. Lone, IPS

Group 2 : Shri Kuldeep Khoda, IPS, Shri A.R.Khan,IPS, Shri M. A. Anjum IPS, Shri R. R. Swain, IPS and Shri Syed Ahmad Sayeed, S.S.P

Group 3 : Shri Madan Lal, IPS, Sheikh Owais Ahmed, IPS, Shri H.K.Lohia, IPS and Shri M. K. Sinha, IPS

Group 4 : Dr. Ashok Bhan, IPS, Shri J. A. Makhdoomi, IPS, Shri P.K.Gupta, IPS, Shri Satvir Gupta, IPS and Shri. Manohar Singh, S.P

Group 5 : Shri S.S.Bijral, IPS, Shri Niyaz Mehmood Mir, IPS and Shri Bashir Ahmad Dar, IPS

The five groups were formed for discussing the Strengths, Weaknesses, opportunities and threats, first among themselves, and then present their opinions and suggestions. Based on the deliberations following matrix of the strengths and weaknesses of the J&K Police were identified. The police officers that participated in the brain-storming session also suggested future policy options. For the exchange of ideas during the brain brain-storming session, Prof. Ashok Aima, Department of Management Studies, University of Jammu, contributed by rendering the professional expertise, as resource person.

Section 1: Identification of core strengths of J&K Police

• Loyalty to organization and Secular approach even during the vitiated atmosphere;

• Manpower with adaptability traits;

• Best knowledge of local population, area, language and culture;

• Decade long experience in tackling proxy war;

• Heterogeneous, highly motivated and cohesive force;

• Successful transition from the conventional role of maintaining law and order duties to fight proxy war;

• Highly motivated with sense of self-sacrifice and devotion to achieve organizational goals; and

• Excellent physical and mental health;

Section 2: Suggestions for strengthening

Core strengths of J&K police

• Strengthening of operating procedures;

• Equipping the force with modern equipment and gadgets we shall have to move faster in the direction of using modern communication gadgets, latest weaponry, scientific tools, computer software and hardware and other equipment;

• Maintaining the heterogeneous composition of the force it has to be a mixed force from different distinct regions of the state;

• Strengthening and broad basing secular character;

• Improving the image of the police;

• Instilling attributes of effective leadership traits at lower level the need to identify and instill the attributes at the level of execution, which encompasses not only junior officers but also the non-gazetted officers and Head Constables;

• Improving the working condition of police in the fast changing life style around them. A composite welfare package for employees in health, safety, social security and many other aspects shall help raising the satisfaction level of the men and contribute in building the morale and level of excellence;

• Building an active and healthy lifestyle in policemen by recognizing the essence of sports are not only the right avenues for generating fellow feeling and fine tuning of higher sensibilities but a gateway to greater resilience and infallibility, core values integral to any uniformed organization;

• Focusing on community policing police needs to be firmly grounded in belief that it has to perform as a specialist consultant, rather than a brutal enforcer. It has to convince the public that they are the beneficiaries of crime prevention and offer them the professional tips on how to help in preventing crime. It has to reach out to such silent areas as are likely to precipitate into crimes and tackle the problem in advance;

• Conquering the hearts of the society we have to render selfless and dedicated service to the people by sharing their grief at the time they need us the most;

• Holding police-public meets regularly changing the police-public relationship from being one of adversaries to one of partnership. People should have the fear of law and not the police. People should be encouraged to attend the police-public meets and air their grievances, which should be recorded and steps taken for their redressal;

• Making police functioning as transparent as possible without affecting the security of the state. This will reduce the misuse of authority and violation of human rights;

• Making martyrs immortal the need is to using novel methods for glorifying the police martyrs, besides taking care of their dependents and inculcating in them a sense of being the members of the vast police family;

• Ensuring transparency in recruitment policy the candidates, seeking to join Police, should be put to thorough tests viz. psychological and language tests apart from the physical tests;

• Putting in place a transfer policy and generally fixed tenure;

• Reorienting training packages for infusing better professionalism. This calls for continuous review of job-analysis that involves studying the job at different levels and assessing the training inputs that need to be injected in various fields including investigations of heinous crimes, bank frauds etc;

• Developing and designing job-oriented in-service training programmes for increasing knowledge and skills of officers and men at unit and sub unit level to maintain pace with new developments;

• Training and acquiring adaptive skills to the different climatic conditions and imparting pre-induction training to its men before deploying for special assignments;

• Introducing multimedia technology for training the men Audio-visual is more appealing, both in technical content and interest generation; and

• Converting training-personnel knowledge into repository for the future reference and policy option analysis.

Section 3: Identification of major weaknesses of J&K Police

• Inability to timely coping-up with the latest technical advancements due to economic hurdles it is not fully equipped with the latest state-ofart technology gadgets required for efficient policing;

• Not fully equipped with the latest weaponry and gadgets ; not skilled enough in weapons and field craft putting bits and pieces together, it has to perform a highly complex mission of conducting war-like operations in combating terrorism;

• Vacuum in normal policing and core duties while concentrating on "fighting the proxy war", it lost sight of professional policing in the areas of police stations for the last nearly two decades now, the police personnel, posted in police stations, are awfully busy in law and order duties which has disturbed their concentration in routine crime work;

• Families of the police personnel, deployed for fighting counter insurgency, have become vulnerable to militants' attacks;

• Inadequate in-service training;

• Laws not innovative and contemporary to keep pace with the fast changing times;

• Absence of a well-defined career- planning policy for lower and middle rung police officers;

• The public and the press are ever-ready to highlight the shortcomings of police shortcomings are in every field but its shortcomings are blown out of proportion;

• Malaise of corruption in the force though this is not the exclusive weakness of police alone yet it causes erosion in its public image because the society expects, and rightly so, highest levels of discipline and integrity from the police ;

• Poor skill up-gradation and knowledge in fighting cyber and other technology driven crimes;

• Shortage of investigating staffthe results in over burden of investigating job and poor conviction rate; and

• Exposed to the changes in the political winds.

Section 4: Suggestions for overcoming weakness of the J&K Police

• Imparting continuous in-service training is not sufficient for maintaining high standards of professionalism. In-service training should be made a continuing process, besides building supporting environment in the work culture. The force should be kept abreast with the developments in the field of scientific investigations, traffic management and the latest laws and judicial pronouncements etc;

• Training in human resources development Apart from the routine physical, legal and professional training aspects, study of human psychology, culture of the state and basic moral values should be made imperative during the training;

• Prescribing better physical and educational standards for recruitment

• Choosing right persons having right attitudes and temperaments towards police profession. We have to keep in mind the type of people we need and the means by which we select them. Enrollment in police department should not be the sole criteria of providing livelihood to unemployed;

• Maintaining close liaison with the community and professional groups public relations building exercises need to be vigorously followed for building the image of police;

• Regular filtering to remove bad elements and developing a mechanism for internal vigilance and policing the police;

• Strengthening of operating procedures it must function strictly within its legal and professional role;

• Evolving effective intra-departmental relations for better sharing of information, experiences and ground level challenges to develop composite and collective operational synergy;

• Institutionalizing leadership at various levels;

• Strengthening the chain of command;

• Rationalizing proportionately the supervision levels in consonance with the growth in size of the force;

• Dissuading from transgressing its role and authority it tries to make up for the shortcomings of other agencies and takes the burden of virtual non-policing works with short-term objectives, and, in the process, it becomes prone to committing excesses, besides loosing focus of the larger charter of the policing mandate;

• Motivating policy a motivational drive needs to be put in place by introducing liberal rewards, out of turn promotions and advance increments to those who display exemplary standards in professional ventures with honesty and dedication;

• Identifying such black sheep as are bringing bad name to whole organization they need to be given an examplary treatment, which shall serve as deterrent to others;

• Modernizing intelligence gathering techniques and methods and sharpening the response mechanism;

• Focusing on the welfare measures of police personnel this shall bring the leadership closer to the men of the force; and

• Strengthening the Police Stations and Police Posts and making them a showcase of a model Police service.

Section 5: policy options and future vision

• Introducing community and ethical policing through this the public can be the most effective and motivated ally of police;

• Introducing state of art technology for effective crime prevention and detection;

• Institutionalizing Police Community relations at different levels of police-public interface;

• Dissuading from transgressing its role and authority Keeping in view the present multiple tasks which police has to perform, it is desirable that all such duties as can be outsourced must be done to help the police to devote more time and energy on their core duties;

• Corporatising the work culture of the force to help it becoming free from the shackles of the colonial dispensations;

• Sending officers, on short-term basis, to other areas in the country to sharpen and broaden their vision;

• Systemizing and institutionalizing common channels of communication and control over grapevines;

• Putting in place better training /logistic /exposure /reward and punishment policies at different hierarchal levels for developing a vibrant structure and process matrix.

• Rewarding outstanding professional achievements and fast track career promotions and other innovative measures to enhance the morale of the force;

• Transforming the image of the Police force to people-friendly, credible and meeting the expectations of the people;

• Increasing the accountability of the force at all the levels so that no one can act indifferent and casual in discharging the duties;

• Bringing about a paradigm change in the basic percepts of Police that it is to serve and not to rule; and

• Proper cadre management policy for the police forces in order to infuse a sense of fairness in the system.

The Epilogue

The relevance of any system is determined by its capacity to meet the needs and aspirations of its stakeholders on sustained basis. This is perhaps the reason that old systems decay and new emerge as a natural process of the law of evolution. In the present societal flux, how can any system retain its relevance and purposeful continuity is the fundamental issue, which any organization needs to understand and respond to. This is particularly true of the institutions, which are the partners in the governance of the country. Therefore, the imperatives of change need to be envisioned well in advance to meet the expectations and legitimate needs of the masses. Police as a vibrant system has not only to constantly pursue with relentless zeal the organizational transformation but has to keep on improving the quality of policing, which will bring respect to the job instead of the present awe and fear, the police inspire. An overhaul of selection norms and procedures and training policies to infuse and buildup mental and intellectual capabilities in the manpower of the police should be the bedrock of the efforts to revitalize and transform the police organization to meet the challenges of the future. Keeping in view the prevailing conditions in the state of Jammu & Kashmir, police has to first be law-abiding force then be the enforcers of law. Respect for human dignity and rights have to be embedded in discharging police duties. This, therefore, requires a special policy rethinking and re-orientation for developing a new code of conduct for the forces in the state.

The future mandate for police will be efficient policing in lieu of the show of strength. The stress in future will be on lean and fit policing. An important possibility of the millennium is the police becoming an elite force with even its bottom levels being manned by highly qualified, skilled and enlightened professionals. Constabulary will be spruced to become striking forces rather than be relegated to work on non-professional jobs.

Above : From left to Right : Dr. Abhijit Gangopadhyay, Prof. and Head Department of Management and Industrial Relations, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, Sh. Gopal Sharma, DGP , Dr. Sudhir S Bloeria, Chief Secretary , Shri Kuldeep Khoda ADGP Armed and Prof. Ashok Kumar Aima of Jammu University at the Inaugural function of the 2-day Conference on "Leadership for managing change and transition".

Below : Lt. General Nirbhay Sharma, AVSM, VSM, GOC 15 Corps, Shri Kuldeep Khoda ADGP Armed , Prof. Ashok Aima of Jammu University and Shri Ram Lubhaya, IGP Traffic at the valedictory function of the Conference.