How do we bridge the gap between Constitutional norms and Operational accountability on the ground, when dealing with crowd control?
Part I
On 20 July 2026, thousands of students converged on the heart of New Delhi, at Jantar Mantar, demanding the resignation of Education Minister Dhramendra Pradhan and reforms to India’s examination system after the NEET paper leak. The outpouring was organic even though the Cockroach Janata Party (CJP) had given a call for Sansad Chalo. Just a day before that, the Delhi Police Commissioner was unceremoniously replaced by the Union Home Ministry. Social Media was littered with videos of how the Delhi Police, RAF and many men in plain uniform, hooligans, etc targeted the students with impunity. Brute force was used. Lathicharge, tear gas, pellet guns – all methods of brute force and excesses were used against the protestors. Police kicked young women.
Shock batons were used on the neck; some reports suggest that even the Delhi Police barricades had electric current. Mainstream Media, as usual, forgot to record this or show any outrage. They were busy blaming the protestors. Youtubers and social media showed the real picture. Police or not, but goons were tearing the clothes of women. Many 15- 16-year-old young women and men complained of brutal physical force. Thousands suffered severe blows and injuries. Hundreds were hospitalised. The internet was shut down in the vicinity, resulting in a breakdown of communications between the hospitalised students and their parents. Visuals of many police officers without badges indiscriminately hitting protestors surfaced. Their names were missing. So it looked as if the government had decided on this type of crackdown, and the police were loyally following the orders. Tear gas, baton charges, pellet rounds, preventive detentions and arrests all were used. Similar protests spread to several states over the following days, with reports of detentions and preventive action against students in Bihar, Rajasthan, Assam, West Bengal and Maharashtra. The Opposition has demanded that the Union Home Minister make a statement in Parliament and that an independent Judicial Commission must be made to ascertain the excessive use of force, including the use of force like stone-pelting against the police.
The events raised a Constitutional question that extends well beyond a single instance. Every Democratic state has a legitimate obligation to maintain public order. Equally, every Constitutional Democracy is expected to protect the Fundamental Right of citizens to assemble peacefully and express dissent. The challenge is not whether the police should enforce the law. The moot question is about the methods used to enforce it remain consistent with Constitutional principles, Democratic accountability and internationally accepted standards governing the use of force.
This distinction is important because discussions on policing in India often descend into binaries. One side portrays every police action as repression. The other treats every use of force as an unavoidable consequence of maintaining order. Neither position adequately reflects the realities faced by officers on the ground or the rights guaranteed to citizens.
An insightful recent article by IPS officer Abhinav Kumar argued that the events at Jantar Mantar revealed failures in planning rather than merely failures of force. He observed that modern protest movements often emerge through decentralised online mobilisation rather than traditional political organisations. Intelligence gathering therefore has to monitor digital mobilisation, identify interlocutors early, engage organisers before confrontation develops and adopt crowd management strategies that prioritise communication over coercion. His central argument was that policing must move at the same speed as the street rather than responding only after tensions have already escalated.
That operational perspective deserves serious consideration. Police officers are frequently required to make split second decisions under difficult circumstances. Crowds are dynamic. Yet operational challenges cannot become a substitute for constitutional accountability.
The literature on policing in India shows remarkable consistency on this point. Whether one reads academic research, judicial decisions, human rights manuals or studies written by former police officers, the conclusion is broadly the same. India’s challenge is not simply that force is sometimes used. It is that institutional safeguards governing when force is used, how much force is used and how accountability follows afterwards remain woefully inadequate.
A recent policy paper published by The Hindu Centre argues that despite changes to India’s criminal justice laws, policing continues to operate within institutional structures that preserve extensive discretionary powers while failing to sufficiently strengthen accountability. Quoting the First National Police Commission, the paper reminds readers that the fundamental challenge has always been to build “an efficient and impartial law enforcement agency” guided by public service and constitutional liberty rather than by coercive authority.
Genuine reform requires reshaping the police into a community sensitive institution firmly committed to the rule of law. The Constitutional debate therefore cannot be reduced to whether the police acted too harshly on one particular day. It is about whether India’s institutional design encourages crowd management or crowd suppression.
This distinction is also reflected in international policing standards. The United Nations Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms require law enforcement officials, wherever possible, to employ non violent means before resorting to force. Where force becomes unavoidable, it must satisfy the principles of necessity, proportionality and restraint. The same principles emphasise minimising injury, preserving human life, providing prompt medical assistance and ensuring accountability whenever force results in injury or death. They also state that in dispersing unlawful but non violent assemblies, force should be avoided wherever possible and, if unavoidable, restricted to the minimum extent necessary.
These are not abstract ideals. They are operational principles intended precisely for moments like those witnessed in Delhi on 20 July.
The broader question, therefore, is not whether governments should preserve public order. They must. Nor is it whether police officers sometimes face dangerous situations. They unquestionably do. The question is whether India’s current approach equips officers with sufficient alternatives to force, while simultaneously assuring citizens that the exercise of coercive power remains transparent, proportionate and accountable.
Part II
The Constitutional position on crowd control in India is considerably clearer than the reality faced by the public. Indian law recognises that the State has both the authority and the obligation to maintain public order. At the same time, it places substantive limits on how that authority may be exercised. The power to disperse an assembly is therefore not an unrestricted policing power. It is a Constitutional power, bounded by legality, necessity, proportionality and accountability.
Whenever protests turn confrontational, this aspect is often lost. Public discussion quickly shifts towards whether demonstrators violated prohibitory orders or whether the police had to “restore law and order.” Yet Constitutional jurisprudence asks a different question. Even where an assembly becomes unlawful, was the force employed the minimum necessary? Were peaceful alternatives genuinely exhausted? Was the response proportionate to the threat? Were adequate warnings issued? Could the objective have been achieved through less intrusive means?
These questions have repeatedly guided the Supreme Court over the past two decades.
One of the most important decisions remains Ramlila Maidan Incident v. Home Secretary, Union of India (2012). The case arose after the midnight police operation against sleeping protesters at Delhi’s Ramlila Maidan in June 2011. While recognising that the State possesses the authority to regulate assemblies and preserve public order, the Supreme Court unequivocally held that police action must remain consistent with Constitutional guarantees under Articles 19 and 21. It emphasised that the right to peaceful protest occupies a central place in Democratic life and that the use of force by the State is permissible only within narrowly defined constitutional limits. The Court observed stressed that even while dispersing an unlawful assembly, authorities remain under an obligation to use only the minimum force necessary to achieve a legitimate objective. The CHRI Handbook on Human Rights and Policing identifies the Ramlila Maidan judgment as one of the leading authorities governing police conduct during public protests and the protection of peaceful assembly.
The Court’s reasoning marked an important shift. It rejected the colonial understanding of crowds as objects to be subdued and instead approached protest as a constitutionally protected democratic activity. The judgment recognised that maintaining public order and protecting civil liberties are complementary obligations rather than competing ones.
This Constitutional philosophy was reaffirmed in Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan v. Union of India (2018). The Court held that restrictions imposed by the State must satisfy the Constitutional test of reasonableness. Citizens cannot be denied the opportunity to assemble merely because dissent creates inconvenience. Democratic governments must regulate protest without extinguishing it.
Equally important is the broader Constitutional framework governing policing itself. The CHRI handbook reminds police authorities that their primary responsibility is not merely the enforcement of law but the protection of Constitutional rights. Policing in a constitutional democracy derives its legitimacy from fidelity to the Constitution rather than from the exercise of coercive power. Every decision taken during crowd control therefore carries a Constitutional dimension because it directly implicates the freedoms of speech, movement and peaceful assembly guaranteed under Articles 19 and the protection of life and personal liberty under Article 21.
These principles closely mirror international legal standards. The United Nations Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials (1990) require that force be governed by three interrelated principles.
First is necessity. Law enforcement officials may resort to force only when non violent means have proved ineffective or clearly have no realistic prospect of achieving the legitimate policing objective.
Second is proportionality. The degree of force must correspond to the seriousness of the threat actually presented rather than to the mere existence of public disorder. Force intended to disperse a crowd cannot exceed what is reasonably required to restore safety.
Third is precaution. Authorities are expected to plan operations in ways that minimise the risk of injury both to protesters and to police personnel. Medical assistance should be provided promptly wherever injuries occur, and operational planning should seek to preserve life rather than simply regain physical control of public spaces. These principles are reflected both in international law and in analyses of Indian policing prepared after the anti CAA protests in Uttar Pradesh, which concluded that any assessment of police action must be measured against necessity, proportionality and precaution rather than against outcomes alone.
Recent judicial observations indicate that the Supreme Court continues to move in this direction. During hearings concerning police action against protesters at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar in July 2026, the Chief Justice reportedly remarked that agitation cannot justify police excess and questioned the continued use of lathi charges as a default crowd control mechanism, emphasising that democratic policing requires restraint even where demonstrations become difficult. Contemporary legal reporting indicates that the Court sought explanations from the authorities regarding the methods employed rather than merely the legality of the protest itself. This shift in emphasis is significant because it places the conduct of the State under the same constitutional scrutiny as the conduct of protesters.
The courts have therefore developed a coherent Constitutional philosophy over time. They have not denied the State the authority to disperse unlawful assemblies. Nor have they suggested that police officers should tolerate violence indefinitely. What they have consistently insisted upon is that coercive power must remain exceptional rather than routine, carefully calibrated rather than indiscriminate, and always subject to subsequent accountability.
This Constitutional framework also serves another purpose that is often overlooked. It protects police officers themselves. Clear legal standards reduce uncertainty during tense operations, provide objective guidance for field commanders, improve operational planning and reduce the likelihood that individual officers become personally exposed to allegations of misconduct arising from poorly planned crowd control decisions. Constitutional policing is therefore not anti police. It is good policing.
That gap between Constitutional doctrine and operational reality has become one of the defining questions of public order policing in contemporary India.
Part III
One of the striking features of the literature reviewed for this essay is the remarkable convergence between studies written by former police officers, constitutional scholars, human rights organisations and academic researchers. They differ in emphasis, but they identify largely the same structural weaknesses. Excessive force during crowd control is seldom the result of a single officer acting in isolation. More often, it reflects institutional shortcomings in planning, training, accountability and political decision making.
One of the earliest comprehensive studies, A Heavy Hand: The Use of Force by India’s Police, published by the Small Arms Survey, argues that democratic societies constantly negotiate the tension between “safeguards by the police” and “safeguards from the police.” The report concludes that India has historically prioritised order maintenance over service oriented policing, a legacy that continues to shape crowd control practices. It also identifies inadequate training, weak accountability mechanisms and insufficient institutional reforms as central reasons why excessive force persists. Significantly, it argues that meaningful reductions in police violence cannot occur without broader criminal justice reforms rather than merely disciplinary action against individual officers.
More recent scholarship arrives at remarkably similar conclusions. A 2025 study on accountability mechanisms in Indian policing argues that the excessive use of force is reinforced by political interference, inconsistent implementation of police reforms, inadequate training, overburdened personnel and weak independent oversight. While legal safeguards have expanded through judicial intervention, the institutional culture governing public order policing has not evolved at the same pace. The paper concludes that accountability mechanisms such as Police Complaints Authorities, recommended nearly two decades ago in Prakash Singh, remain unevenly implemented across states.
The most revealing evidence, however, comes from within the policing system itself. The Status of Policing in India Report 2025, based on one of the country’s largest surveys of police personnel, suggests that many officers themselves recognise structural deficiencies in training, resources and operational preparedness. At the same time, the report records that significant sections of the police continue to view the use of physical force as a necessary component of maintaining public order under difficult operational conditions. These findings complicate the public narrative. They suggest that excessive force cannot simply be understood as individual misconduct. It is also a product of institutional expectations, operational pressures and inadequate professional preparation.
Several contemporary case studies illustrate these structural weaknesses. The anti Sterlite protests in Thoothukudi in 2018 remain among the most significant examples of contested crowd control in recent years. Following extensive investigations, the Aruna Jegadeesan Commission concluded that numerous police and administrative officials bore responsibility for excessive force during the firing that killed thirteen protesters. The report criticised operational decision making, recommended departmental proceedings against several officials and questioned the justification for orders authorising the use of firearms. Yet, despite years of inquiry, accountability has remained limited, reinforcing concerns that institutional review mechanisms often struggle to translate findings into consequences.
The response to the anti Citizenship Amendment Act protests in Uttar Pradesh similarly attracted sustained legal scrutiny. The International Commission of Jurists concluded that aspects of the police response, including the use of firearms, baton charges and less lethal weapons, raised serious questions under both Indian constitutional law and international human rights standards. Rather than evaluating crowd control solely through the lens of restoring order, the report examined whether the operations satisfied the internationally recognised principles of necessity, proportionality and precaution. It concluded that these standards had not been consistently observed.
The recurrence of similar criticisms across unrelated incidents suggests that India faces a systemic rather than episodic challenge.
International experience offers an instructive contrast. While no democratic policing model is free from controversy, several jurisdictions have consciously shifted away from the philosophy of crowd suppression towards one of crowd management.
The United Kingdom has progressively institutionalised a system of graded command during major public order operations through the Gold, Silver and Bronze command structure. Operational commanders are expected to conduct detailed risk assessments, maintain continuous communication with protest organisers, document every escalation decision and ensure post operation review.
Sweden’s Dialogue Police model has become one of the most widely studied innovations in democratic protest policing. Instead of viewing communication as a preliminary step before force, specially trained dialogue officers remain in continuous contact with organisers before, during and after demonstrations. Their role is to reduce misunderstanding, defuse tension and isolate violent actors without unnecessarily confronting peaceful participants.
A third influential example comes from Northern Ireland, where decades of political conflict fundamentally transformed public order policing. Following the Patten reforms, the Police Service of Northern Ireland adopted a human rights based operational philosophy in which every crowd control decision is assessed against legality, necessity, proportionality and accountability. Extensive planning, video recording of operations, command accountability and post incident review became routine rather than exceptional features of major demonstrations.
These examples do not suggest that foreign models can simply be transplanted into India. India’s scale, political diversity and frequency of mass mobilisation present unique operational challenges. Nevertheless, they demonstrate that democracies can successfully maintain public order while relying less on coercion and more on communication, planning and transparency.
Perhaps the most important lesson emerging from comparative policing is conceptual rather than technological. The objective is no longer to defeat a crowd. It is to manage risk while preserving constitutional freedoms. Violence is addressed by isolating those responsible rather than treating the entire gathering as an adversarial force.
Part IV
The debate on police excesses often oscillates between two extremes. One demands unconditional support for every police action undertaken in the name of maintaining order. The other condemns every use of force as evidence of authoritarianism. Neither approach offers a sustainable framework for democratic policing. The real challenge is to strengthen both constitutional freedoms and the operational capacity of the police. A professional police force should be judged not only by its ability to restore order but also by its ability to preserve public trust while doing so.
Therefore, I suggest three broad reforms that could fundamentally improve India’s approach to crowd control.
The first reform is to professionalise public order policing by replacing reactive force with planned crowd management.
Most democratic jurisdictions no longer treat crowd control as a routine extension of ordinary policing. It is regarded as a specialised discipline requiring dedicated training, operational planning and negotiation. India has invested significantly in modernising weapons, surveillance and intelligence capabilities, but comparatively less attention has been devoted to specialised crowd management techniques.
Dedicated public order units should receive continuous training in negotiation, behavioural psychology, de escalation, communication and graded use of force. Every major demonstration should be preceded by structured engagement with organisers, advance risk assessment and clearly designated liaison officers. Such reforms have become standard practice in countries such as Sweden and the United Kingdom, where dialogue policing and structured command systems seek to prevent confrontation before it begins rather than relying upon force after tensions have escalated.
The second reform is to institutionalise independent accountability for every serious use of force during crowd control operations.
One of the recurring findings across academic studies, judicial decisions and policy reports is that accountability mechanisms remain fragmented and inconsistent. Investigations are often conducted by the same institutional hierarchy involved in the operation, public reporting is limited and lessons learned rarely translate into systemic reform. This weakens public confidence while simultaneously depriving police organisations of valuable opportunities for institutional learning.
The Supreme Court’s decision in Prakash Singh v. Union of India recognised this problem nearly two decades ago by directing states to establish independent Police Complaints Authorities. Implementation, however, has remained uneven across the country. Numerous subsequent studies continue to identify weak oversight as one of the principal reasons why allegations of excessive force rarely produce institutional change.
Every major crowd control operation resulting in death, grievous injury or significant allegations of excessive force should therefore automatically trigger an independent review. Such reviews should examine not merely individual conduct but operational planning, command decisions, communication failures, deployment strategies and compliance with the principles of necessity and proportionality. Body worn cameras, mandatory preservation of operational recordings and time bound publication of inquiry findings would improve transparency while also protecting officers against unfounded allegations.
Importantly, accountability should not be understood as punishment alone. It is equally a mechanism for improving future operational performance.
The third reform is to place Constitutional rights at the centre of public order policing rather than treating them as obstacles to policing.
India’s Constitutional jurisprudence has consistently recognised that peaceful assembly is not an administrative privilege granted by the State but a democratic freedom protected under Articles 19 and 21. Crowd control must therefore begin with a presumption in favour of facilitating peaceful protest while isolating and responding proportionately to unlawful conduct by individuals.
This requires a shift in institutional philosophy. The objective of police operations should not be to disperse every gathering at the earliest opportunity. Rather, the objective should be to facilitate peaceful assembly wherever possible while intervening only against conduct that genuinely threatens public safety. International standards embodied in the United Nations Basic Principles similarly require law enforcement agencies to exhaust non violent alternatives before resorting to force and, where force becomes unavoidable, to employ only the minimum level necessary to achieve a legitimate policing objective.
Such an approach also protects police personnel. Clear operational protocols reduce uncertainty, improve command decisions and provide officers with objective standards against which their actions can later be evaluated. Professional restraint should never be mistaken for institutional weakness. On the contrary, restraint exercised with confidence reflects organisational strength.
The events surrounding the student protests of 20th July 2026 have once again brought these questions into public focus. We have also witnessed how the present regime used brute force in the Farmers’ protest and the CAA protests, few years ago.
India does not suffer from an absence of legal authority. Indian police already possess extensive statutory powers to regulate assemblies and maintain public order. The real deficit lies in professional training, operational planning, independent oversight and institutional accountability.
The First National Police Commission articulated the challenge almost half a century ago when it argued that the fundamental task was to build “an efficient and impartial law enforcement agency” guided by service to the public and respect for constitutional liberties rather than coercive authority alone. That aspiration remains unfinished.
Democracies are ultimately judged not by how they police citizens who agree with the government but by how they police citizens who peacefully disagree with it. A police force that is better trained, more accountable, more responsive and more restrained is not merely better for protesters. It is better for the police, better for governments and, ultimately, better for Democracy itself.
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