Cops struggling to cope with overstretched duty

It was a Sunday afternoon. Two on-duty policemen were sitting on a bench on the sidewalk of Kazi Nazrul Islam Avenue in the capital's Karwan Bazar area. While one was watching over the pedestrians' movement and the other was taking a nap with his chin rested on the back of his palm placed on the muzzle of his rifle.

As these correspondents started talking to his colleague, the constable woke up. His eyes were red and face bore clear signs of exhaustion.

And he himself explained it all.

"I have to wake up at 2 in the morning and rush to the Public Order Management unit of police at Mirpur from my house at Madartek and be ready for duty by 5,” he said, wishing anonymity.

It is almost 10 at night when he returns home, meaning he gets barely four hours to rest a day. This has been going on since the countrywide blockade started on January 6, triggering a fresh spell of violence that has claimed at least 81 lives so far.

Like him, more than 80 percent of the police personnel assigned to maintain law and order during the turmoil are under immense stress with little time for family, no weekly holidays and no leaves, except for emergency cases.

The Daily Star recently talked to over a dozen policemen in Dhaka city and three other districts of the country and all of them told of extreme tiredness as they have to work from 15 to 18 hours a day, almost double the normal work hours, since the blockade began.

"I have not had a good sleep since the blockade started. I feel dizzy while on duty," said another constable at Chankharpool area.

A visibly weary sub-inspector of police, deployed on the Dhaka University campus, said he had been feeling sick for the past few days but hadn't been granted leave.

The family of Officer-in-Charge Syed Ziauzzaman of Pallabi Police Station lives within five kilometres from his station. Yet, he could visit them only thrice in the last one month.

However, he was far from being dispirited. "We have the experience to work under such stress and we'll continue to do so to ensure public safety and maintain law and order,” he said.

Overstretched by the hartal and blockade duties, police are taking longer in completing regular tasks, like investigating cases.

Abu Bakar Siddique, Inspector (Investigation) of Bhatara Police Station in the capital, said 37 cases were filed in January and they could complete investigations of 27. Had the situation been normal, they could have handled more cases, he added.

On an average, 918 cases were filed a month with the 49 police stations in the metropolis over the last six months, according to Dhaka Metropolitan Police. And police sources said there's been a 25 percent drop in completing investigations since January 6.

For example, a case was filed with Rampura Police Station on January 30 following the murder of Fahmida Akhtar, daughter of Akhtarul Alam, late acting editor of the Daily Ittefaq.

Family says there has been no apparent development in the investigation as the police are busy with hartal and blockade duties.

"The Criminal Investigation Department of police, however, took over the case three days back as the police station did not have time to pay attention to it," said a relative of Fahmida, wishing anonymity, yesterday.

Continuous exposure to stress for a long time affects police personnel's behaviour and the quality of their service to people, thinks ASM Shahjahan, former inspector general of police and adviser to a caretaker government.

He suggested the police authorities work out a plan to ensure proper rest for policemen as soon as possible.

However, it wouldn't be an easy task under the existing circumstances.

To serve a population of around 15 crore, the force has around 1.5 lakh personnel at the moment, with about 27,000 of them in the DMP, police headquarters data show.

"This means, we have one policeman for every 1,031 people in Bangladesh. Elsewhere, there is one policeman for 728 people in India, for 625 in Pakistan, for 249 in Malaysia, and for 228 in Thailand," said an official of the police headquarters, preferring anonymity.

"According to the UN standard, there should be one policeman for every 400 people. This means we have less than half of the required manpower," he said.

Against this backdrop, the government has announced to recruit 50,000 people in the force in the next three years, with 10,000 constables likely to be appointed by May this year, he added.