The Bombay City Police: A Historical Sketch, 1672-1916

by S. M. Edwardes

The establishment at the beginning of 1911 of a “Police Gazette”, appearing thrice in the twenty-four hours and containing full details of all reported crimes, persons wanted, property stolen or lost, etc., was a further step in the direction of increased efficiency. Prior to this date, when a case of theft occurred, the first duty of the Inspector, in whose jurisdiction it took place, was to prepare with his own hand thirty or forty notices for dispatch to other police-stations in the City. Much valuable time was thus wasted; and when the notices were ready, several constables had to be released from their proper duties to act as messengers. Under the system introduced in 1911 the duty of the sectional officer consisted simply in telephoning full details to the Deputy Commissioner C. I. D., who arranged for their insertion in the next issue of the “Gazette”, copies of which were delivered at every police station within a few hours of the occurrence. The arrangements were adapted from the system followed in London and effected a great saving of time and trouble in the divisions. In 1915 the Police Notice Office, composed of a European Inspector and an Indian head constable, circulated in this way nearly 10,000 paragraphs and 67 supplements dealing with murders, thefts, deserters and persons wanted, and also published and circulated to the divisions forty pages of special orders concerned with daily routine.

Another salient feature of the reorganization, as mentioned above, was the creation of a special agency for the divisional investigation of crime. This was dependent upon the provision of properly-equipped police stations of a definite type, recommended by Mr. Edwardes, comprising the necessary offices, charge-room, cells, quarters for the European and Indian staff, and barracks for the constabulary. The scheme, as sanctioned, contemplated the provision of 17 stations of this character. At the date when Mr. Edwardes was appointed Commissioner, none of the existing police-stations fulfilled these requirements, and in some divisions paucity of accommodation directly hampered the daily work of the police. In 1911, for example, the station of the Khetwadi section of the D division was described as practically non-existent. The lease of a building having expired, and no alternative accommodation being available, the Inspector was holding his office in the dressing-room of an Indian theatre in Grant road, the station-stores and constables’ kit-boxes were temporarily placed in a tea-shop in Falkland road, and the two European officers of the section were forced to reside in very poor quarters in an adjoining section. Most of the older stations were very inconvenient and insanitary. The only office consisted of one of the sectional Inspector’s dwelling-rooms or of a portion of a verandah screened off; prisoners and witnesses were herded together on the stairs or in the street; the residence was surrounded by old-fashioned and odoriferous latrines; and every odd corner was choked with kit-boxes and with the recumbent forms of constables taking a rest before going on duty.

By the end of 1910, however, a complete programme for new stations had been prepared, and sanctioned by Government, and a commencement had been made in Colaba, Nagpada and Agripada, where the newer police-stations erected by the Improvement Trust were subjected to structural alterations and additions, in order to make them conform with the plan adapted from the London model. Each of these stations was equipped with a staff composed of one Inspector, one Deputy Inspector, three Indian Sub-Inspectors for criminal investigation, plain-clothes constables and a clerical staff; the first information sheet, case-diary and other records used by the District Police were so adapted to urban requirements as to secure a complete record of every case taken up by the police; and the time-table of duties was arranged so that at any moment during the twenty-four hours an English-knowing officer, with power to record complaints and commence inquiries, would be found in the general charge-room of the station. At the outset most of the Indian Sub-Inspectors were chosen from among the few English-knowing Jemadars and Havildars, already in the force; but from 1910 onwards a regular supply of such officers was secured by choosing young Indians of good middle-class standing and deputing them to the Provincial Police Training School at Nasik for an eighteen months’ course of tuition in law and police-work.

At the beginning of 1913 the Commissioner opened two more stations on the new model at Princess Street—a building erected by the Improvement Trust in 1910, and at Maharbaudi: and two more in 1914 in the new buildings of the Harbour and Dock police at Mody Bay and Frere road respectively, which were completed and occupied in January. At the beginning of January, 1916, three more stations were established under the reorganization scheme at Khetwadi, Hughes road, and the Esplanade, while at the close of the same year similar stations were organized in the new buildings erected at Gamdevi, Lamington road and Palton road. Thus, by the end of 1916 thirteen out of the seventeen model police-stations, originally proposed by the Commissioner, had been opened with a full complement of officers and men, while plans had been approved for similar accommodation in Mahim, Parel and other places in the northern portion of the Island of Bombay. Where it was found impossible to build full residential accommodation for both officers and men on the site allotted for these new stations, ancillary accommodation schemes were prepared, which, when completed, would ensure the proper housing of the majority of the force as it existed at the date of Mr. Edwardes’ departure.

A sustained effort was made during these years to teach English to the Indian constabulary, with the object of giving the men themselves a better chance of promotion and enabling them to hold their own more confidently with the large English-speaking population. In 1910 the number of officers, exclusive of Europeans, able to read and write was 127, of whom only 36 were literate in English, while literate constables, of whom only one or two knew English, numbered 584. In July 1911 the Commissioner commenced sending a chosen number of Muhammadan and Hindu constables to two free night-schools for instruction in English and one vernacular language. The success attending this experiment led the Bombay Government to sanction a proposal to open an English school for constables at the Head Police Office, under a qualified teacher from one of the official training-schools maintained by the Educational Department. This school was attended by 150 constables from the various branches of the force, who were given a three years’ course of tuition in English, and on Saturdays attended lectures on their duty to the public, their powers under the Police Act, and matters of simple hygiene. In 1913 the number of men attending the school had risen to 200, and the master had been forced to obtain gratuitous assistance in teaching the various classes. The question of accommodation also became urgent, and during 1915 and 1916 the classes had to be assembled in the Elphinstone Middle School, which the educational authorities allowed the police to use during the early morning and evening hours. The men, who were encouraged to study by the grant of small rewards and occasionally of promotion, if they were successful in the periodical examinations, derived distinct advantage from the school-course, and the number of constables literate in the English language showed a steady increase between 1911 and 1916. In the latter year 846 constables were reported to be able to read and write, and 72 of them were literate in English. Connected with the subject of education was the foundation of a fund in the name of the Commissioner—the S. M. E. Memorial Fund—subscribed by Hindu and Muhammadan residents, with the object of assisting Indian constables of the force to educate their sons. The proposal was made in the first instance by Mr. Kazi Kabiruddin, a barrister and Justice of the Peace, and at his instance sufficient funds were subsequently provided to admit of the grant of monthly scholarships and stipends to the sons of constables attending primary schools maintained by the Municipal Corporation.

A large amount of routine work devolved upon the police under the Arms, Explosives, Petroleum and Poisons Acts. Under the Arms Act licenses of various kinds were granted or cancelled, the shops and store-rooms of licensed dealers were regularly inspected and their stocks checked, and constant inquiries, numbering several thousand annually, were made to verify purchases from local dealers and trace the whereabouts of fire-arms. In 1911, just before the arrival of Their Majesties the King and Queen, five revolvers were stolen from a licensed dealer’s shop. The C. I. D. were successful in recovering the arms and in obtaining the conviction of the thieves: but in consideration of the approach of the Royal Visit, the Commissioner decided to take charge of the entire stock of arms and ammunition held by five Indian dealers, and kept it in deposit in the Head Police Office until after the departure of Their Majesties. Under the Explosives Act licenses were issued for manufacture, possession and sale; and magazines for the storage of explosives were regularly inspected by the special branch maintained for this purpose at headquarters. Similar duties were carried out under the Petroleum Act; while from April 1st, 1909, the Police became responsible for licensing the sale of poisons and checking stocks,—duties which up to that date had been performed by the Municipality. The task of licensing theatres and granting performance licenses, which was transferred to the Arms department at the close of 1909, imposed a heavy additional burden on the special staff. Most of the theatres at this date were devoid of proper exits and of means of protection against fire, and these seven years witnessed a continuous struggle to secure the erection of fire-proof staircases etc. and the provision of fire-proof drop-curtains. Fortunately the Police were able to obtain the help of the Chief of the Fire-brigade and of the Government engineering and electrical experts, in deciding what improvements were essential in each case, and it was chiefly due to this collaboration that a better fire-service had been installed by 1913 in each of the thirteen theatres of the City, and that many important structural alterations in both theatres and cinematographs had been introduced by the close of 1916. Perhaps the most notable achievement of the headquarters staff under Chief Inspector M. J. Giles was the preparation of a set of theatre rules, applicable to all structures used for public performances, which were brought into force in August 1914, and gave the police power to insist upon the provision of fire-appliances, water supply, exits, and fire-proof materials. As mentioned in a previous paragraph, the C. I. D. was made responsible for the scrutiny of plays, for which a performance license was required, and licenses were granted only to such plays as were declared by that department to be unobjectionable on political, moral or general grounds.

The growth in the number of motor-vehicles continued unchecked and ultimately necessitated the promulgation of new rules under the Motor Vehicles Act in 1915. In 1909, the total number of motor-vehicles registered since 1905 was 1,295, while in 1915 this figure had increased to 4,947. But a good many of these gradually disappeared in the course of ten years, and the actual number estimated to be on the roads in 1915 was 2,482 as compared with only 814 in 1909. Heavy motor-vehicles of the lorry type also appeared during this period and numbered 70 in 1915. This increase of motor-traffic synchronized with, and was partly responsible for, a steady increase in the number of street accidents. While reckless driving was unquestionably the cause of many accidents, despite energetic action in several directions to prevent it, the large majority of the casualties reported from year to year were the outcome of that carelessness and lack of alertness on the part of the average Indian pedestrian, with which all who have driven cars or carriages in Bombay are only too well acquainted. Accustomed as they are to the peace of a sequestered country life, many of the foot-passengers in the streets of the city seem totally unable to exercise any caution or to acquire the habit of keeping to the side of the road, while in the case of the mill-workers, whom one meets in Parel and elsewhere, the sense of hearing seems to have been permanently dulled by the constant rattle and clatter of the machinery at which they labour during the greater part of the day.

The Haj traffic continued to expand between 1909 and 1911, the total number of pilgrims who left Bombay for Jeddah in those years being 19,748 and 21,965 respectively. From 1912 the numbers commenced to decline until the year after the outbreak of the War, when the traffic virtually ceased altogether. The period witnessed a struggle on the part of a British shipping-firm to secure the monopoly of the Red Sea trade, including the pilgrim traffic, by ousting the few Muhammadan-owned vessels which had hitherto catered for the pilgrims. The firm in question was unquestionably in a position to offer better vessels and a better organization for the return journey than the Indian ship-owners: but one or two of the latter resented the effort to drive them out of the traffic, with the result that the Commissioner of Police and the Pilgrim department, who endeavoured to act in a strictly neutral manner, ran the risk of blame from both parties for showing undue preference to their rivals. At the moment of the Declaration of War all the vessels engaged in the traffic were owned by the British firm, except one or at most two which belonged to a well-known Muhammadan resident. It might have been supposed that, considering the wholly Islamic character of the pilgrimage, a British firm would have acquiesced in the continued presence of a Muhammadan-owned vessel, and have trusted to time and the ordinary economic law for its ultimate disappearance from the Jeddah route. Such, however, was not the case; and at the instance of the local manager of the firm, a pushing Scot from Aberdeen, the Bombay Government was asked practically to insist upon the Commissioner and the Pilgrim department refusing all facilities to the Muhammadan ship-owner to sell his tickets and dispatch his vessel. The outbreak of War in 1914, and the consequent cessation of the traffic to and from Jeddah, solved a dispute which for some time imposed additional work upon the Police and Pilgrim authorities.

The Finger Print Bureau steadily maintained its efficiency and had compiled a record of more than 45,000 slips by the end of 1915. At the request of the municipal authorities, it commenced about 1912 to take the finger-impressions of hundreds of candidates for employment as sweepers in the Health department, and was able to prove annually from its records that a certain proportion of these people had previous convictions under the Penal Code. In another direction—revolver-practice by the European police—a considerable improvement was effected. Up to 1914 it was customary to arrange for the practice in a field at the back of the China Mill at Sewri, which was sufficiently remote and secluded to obviate danger to the public. But the distance of the site from the centre of the City rendered the regular attendance of all officers practically impossible, and in consequence, on the rare occasions when the European police were called upon to use their revolvers at disturbances, their shooting was inclined to be a trifle erratic. In the Muharram riots of 1908, for example, when Mr. Gell ordered the European officers to fire on the mob in Bhendy Bazar, a Parsi who was watching the rioting from the window of a third upper-storey was unfortunately killed by a revolver-shot, directed at the crowd in the street. To ensure more regular practice by all officers, therefore, the Commissioner obtained the approval of Government to the erection of a safety revolver range in the compound of the Head Police Office, which was opened in September, 1914.