Absenteeism hits Delhi Police force

An alarming rise in the number of absentees among Delhi Police personnel has led to inadequate strength for law and order duty in the national capital.

An alarming rise in the number of absentees among Delhi Police personnel has led to inadequate strength for law and order duty in the national capital.

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Between January 1 and July 31, 2008, more than 5,000 personnel of the capital's police force have gone on leave most of them unscheduled and without getting sanction from the authorities.

A total of 5,509 such cases were detected during the said period in which 4,121 men and 1,388 women personnel absented themselves from their duties, according to data provided by Delhi Police in response to an RTI application.

Surprisingly, 85 per cent of them even did not bother to inform their higher-ups about their absence.

Most absentees were field duty personnel, leading to the inadequate force deployment in the capital's law and order duties, the data said.

Though some of these absenting Delhi Police personnel joined office after a week or after a fortnight, many of them report for work after months, that too, without informing the authorities, it said.

At a time when crime rate in the city is increasing and recovery of narcotics and explosive material from the neighbouring states is on a surge, such a lax condition inside the law enforcement agency poses a serious question over its ability to deal with the criminals.