Hubris is dogging the government’s use of force. On July 20, the Delhi Police confronted the Cockroach Janta Party’s “Chalo Sansad” march — a movement born of student anger over the NEET-UG paper leak and the CBSE’s botched revaluation process and demanding Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan’s resignation — with a response that, by any independent account, “breached all known protocols of crowd control”.This is not surprising. Across the country, be it Manipur or Uttar Pradesh, due process or procedural justice doesn’t exist. In UP, an unconscionable number of those accused of crimes seem to get shot in the legs. The UP police has itself admitted that since 2017 , they have arrested some 30,000 alleged criminals and conducted some 15,000 “encounters” in which 9,000 suspects were shot in the legs. This points to a disturbing normalisation of extra-judicial methods.Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty.The only “weapon” in the hands of the GenZ agitators was the ubiquitous mobile phone — and it did more to expose the state’s conduct than any commission of inquiry would have managed in years. Phone cameras gave the country granular detail of the abuse of power that followed: policemen in uniform – and some without, who could as easily have been provocateurs as enforcers — wading violently into students; the Rapid Action Force (RAF) firing pellet guns at protesters who posed no threat; and a government response that extended well beyond the street, cutting mobile internet, shutting metro stations near the protest site, detaining young people at random, and even leaning on food-delivery platforms to stop deliveries to the sit-in. That last detail — petty, bureaucratic, almost embarrassed of itself — tells you more about the state of mind in North Block than any of the more dramatic images do.Among the more troubling episodes was the discovery of a truck full of stones parked near Jantar Mantar ahead of the “Chalo Sansad” march on July 20th. CJP activists filmed it and a lot more . The police itself claims that using facial recognition systems indicates some 2000+ criminals were loitering in the area between July 20-24. If that was indeed so, what did the police do in dealing with them?Civil policing is not an exact science. It is an art of sorts that requires a judicious mixture of common sense and firmness to deal with protests which can be on a range of issues of concern to a citizen and can sometimes descend to violence. There are common sense protocols such as those suggested by NATO and the UN which call for a phased escalation of depending on the circumstances. These involve a disciplined presence of the police at the site of a protest, the employment of riot shields, batons and barriers to redirect crowds and only thereafter the use of non-lethal weapons like rubber and plastic bullets, water cannons or tear gas. There are targeting protocols that say that non-lethal projectiles must never be aimed at the head, face or neck. And there are chemicals and agents that are not permitted to be used.It is not the job of the police to pass judgment on the agitation or posit themselves as adversaries of the agitators. Their job is to ensure that the protest fulfils the legal requirements and does not degenerate into violence. Some common sense and forbearance is expected from police personnel. They should not react in a manner that adds fuel to the fire i.e. chucking stones at agitators, or taking recourse to a lathi charge when some reasoning and persuasion can do the needful.In this case, the situation arose when the CJP gathering, which had permission to demonstrate at Jantar Mantar, decided to breach the police barricades and march on Parliament. This was not a surprise development since the march to Parliament had been announced well in advance even though they lacked the permission to do so. There could have been ways and means to prevent them from doing so, other than the random and somewhat brutal use of force.What is amazing is that there was not a trace of sophistication in the Delhi Police’s handling of the agitated protestors either in their employment or equipment. They lacked numbers to deal with the situation, they did not have the shields and helmets needed for self-protection (which encourages restraint). Their tactic was confined to attack, attack and attack by all means, including the dubious use of policemen sans uniform. Indeed, by their tactics they converted a law and order situation into a riot.India has had a long history of protest, violent and non-violent. But one thing that stands out is the police force’s inability to improve the ways they handle it. Reform is reluctant and piecemeal. Back in the 1970s, full sized lathis were banned in the Delhi Police because of an incident in which a man fell off a roof of a building after a lathi charge during an agitation.But even the short lathis have been replaced by polycarbonate canes that were used in Jantar Mantar. Indeed, some social media sites have shown photos of lathis studded with nails.Perhaps the biggest question mark in the handling of events relates to the use of pellet guns by the RAF that had been thrown in to assist the Delhi Police. These were meant for crowd control in Kashmir in the late 2000s and certainly not suited for a non-violent civil protest in the heart of New Delhi. Yet they were used and have caused visible injury to some of the protestors. The Delhi Police, ingenuously, said they do not possess such weapons, but they have not said anything about the fact that the RAF is equipped with them and did use them in action which was nominally, at least, under the control of the Delhi Police.These guns fire shots of steel covered with rubber and as the pictures of their effect reveal, they can be dangerous, especially if they are used at ranges less than 50 metres. A scientific study published in 2001, showed that such pellet guns were responsible for a large number of eye injuries when the Israelis had used them against Palestinians. Not surprisingly, there has been a case of eye injury as a result of the use of such a gun at Jantar Mantar as well.These semi-lethal guns are supposed to be used after warning a crowd which is veering towards violence. Orders mandate they must be aimed low, below the waist. Its not clear under whose orders these guns were used since a magistrate is supposed to authorise the use of the kind of force the gun implies. Was any order even given under Section 129 of the BNSS ordering the crowd to disperse and authorise the use of force?The RAF has yet to acknowledge the use of pellet guns. But according to news reports, their chief has taken cognisance of the news reports and banned the use of such non-lethal weapons across the country by the force. She has indirectly, at least, acknowledged that there was a failure on the part of the RAF in not applying its crowd control protocols at the Jantar Mantar. On Monday a news item confirmed that a single gun had been used and had fired a number of shots at the protestors.The police cannot alone be blamed for this situation. The blame lies with the politicians and bureaucrats who are responsible for Delhi’s security. They repeat a pattern that is visible across the country: They light fires by messing up their jobs in running the country and then they use the police to douse the fires. They talk loudly about the arrival of a Viksit Bharat, but as of now there are no signs that their medieval police force is anywhere near that ideal.In a democracy, the right to peaceful protest is fundamental. For a nation that won its independence through mass civil resistance, peaceful protest should enjoy a special constitutional and moral protection. Governments may disagree with those who dissent, but they should never seek to suppress dissent through fear or excessive force. That is the true test of democratic confidence.Manoj Joshi is a distinguished fellow with the Observer Research Foundation.This piece was first published on The India Cable – a premium newsletter from The Wire – and has been updated and republished here. To subscribe to The India Cable, click here.