BHUBANESWAR: Odisha tops the list of States in terms of average working hours of police personnel, who clock over 18 hours a day, a study has revealed. On average, one in two police personnel in the State work overtime regularly and eight out of ten do not get paid for overtime. The State is followed by Punjab where the duty hours is around 17 hours.
In states like Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan and Telangana, police personnel work for 16 hours day.
As per the Status of Policing in India Report-2019 by Common Cause and Centre for the Study Developing Societies (CSDS), irregular and long working hours not only affect the physical health but also contribute to mental stress among police personnel, ultimately impacting the efficiency of the force.
While about 60 per cent police personnel in Odisha work for more than 16 hours and 22 per cent work for more than 13 hours a day, only four per cent work for eight hours. For the bulk of the police force in the State, it is far from the ideals set out by the Model Police Act, 2006, of fixed shifts of eight hours.
The survey conducted in 22 States finds the forces work with three-fourth of the required capacity and police personnel with more years of experience report longer working hours.About 33 per cent police personnel having above 25 years of experience and 24 per cent with up to five years of experience work for more than 16 hours a day.
Police in the State are forced to work overtime despite having less vacancy compared to all India average and States like Haryana, West Bengal, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana. The overall police strength in the State is 85.4 per cent against the national average of 77.4 per cent.
The average working hours of men is also one hour longer than their women counterparts and the divide exists primarily at the constabulary level.At senior positions, men and women officers have similar working hours. Moreover, civil police work for longer duration than armed police, the study found.
It also indicated that senior State police officers had to work overtime as compared to constabulary police and a higher proportion of civil police as compared to armed police stayed back at their station several times a week.
“After more than 70 years of independence, Indian police laws continue to echo the spirit of the colonial Indian Police Act of 1861, with little regard for either service conditions, particularly those at the lower levels or for the citizens of the country whom they serve,” the report stated.
Although police is a State subject, most of the State Police Acts are influenced either by the archaic Police Act of 1861 or the Model Police Act of 2006, it added.