Rs1,000 for character certificate, Rs3,000 for passport verification: Maha police dept’s bribe rates

The senior constable recently wrote to the inspector general of police (Kolhapur Range), highlighting the corrupt practices prevalent in the police stations in the region

Rs1,000 for character certificate, Rs3,000 for passport verification and Rs500 for a lost certificate – these, according to a senior constable from Kolhapur, are the rates for bribes charged by police officers in the region that is around 200km away from Pune.

The senior constable recently wrote to the inspector general of police (Kolhapur Range), highlighting the corrupt practices prevalent in the police stations in the region (FILE)

The senior constable recently wrote to the inspector general of police (Kolhapur Range), highlighting the corrupt practices prevalent in the police stations in the region. According to the officer, bribe is the only way to get police certificates for lost documents, loudspeaker, public events, shop licences and passports. Criminal cases involving amounts in the range of Rs50,000 to Rs1 lakh are settled at the police station, without filing a case, said the officer.

According to the complaint, policemen illegally take money from small vendors during Diwali and 25% of them have assets worth crores.

Taking note of the letter, Vishwas Nangre-Patil, inspector general of police (Kolhapur range), has issued directives to all five district police heads under him to look into the claims.

The order, with a copy of the 21-point list of observation of the policeman, states: “A senior police constable based on his experience in the police department has expressed his observations about police’s functioning system. Based on these observations, introspection [by district heads] must be done and accordingly measures to run a clean and corruption-free police administration shall be initiated and implemented.”

Patil said, “A senior constable has made serious observations on malpractices and corruption in police stations and brought it to my notice through an anonymous letter. I find relevance in his observations and hence asked all my SPs to look into it, study the observations made by the constable and send me their reports.”

GRAPHICS: THE OBSERVATIONS

Some of the observations made in the letter, a copy of which is with HT

Bribe is the only option to get police certificates for lost documents, loudspeaker, public events, shop licence, passport bribe is the only option

Policemen collect Rs3,000 to Rs5,000 from each sweet shop and firecrackers shop owner during Diwali and share the amount with the in charge.

A policeman takes bribe between Rs100-Rs1,000 to give clearance for every TA (travelling allowance) bill that he claims from the accounts department in superintendent office.