Since the independence of Bangladesh, Bangladesh Police developed gradually acquiring more and more responsibility as well as enhancing the significance of this prestigious department over time. To give a quick example of such, the success of ‘Counter Terrorism Unit’ of Bangladesh Police over last couple of years has to be mentioned in particular. After the shocking radical terrorist attack at the Holy Artisan Bakery in 2016, this particular unit of police has truly shown their colour by managing the situation, conducting repeated successful operations and thus keeping the country safe and secure from this miserable curse. Despite being one of the leading and admired departments as it should be; like many other countries, here in Bangladesh too; we have seen unwanted activities (in opposition to their stated ideal role) conducted by police officials time to time including but not limited to: corruption, crime (both criminal and civil in nature), brutality and violation of human rights and many more. Moreover, the sharp rise of frequency (of such unwanted activities) now days, as deemed from the news published in different mass communication medium, aware us to look into this issue with utmost priority. Being the vital most civil force, police serve citizens directly and therefore, any exception of desired professionalism would result grave loss from state’s perspective. Also unprofessional act/ behaviour will open the scope of direct accusation towards the force as a whole as like any other state owned civil department, credibility of police solely stands over its image and acts created by its personnel. Considering all of these, unprofessional behaviour of police personnel in professional work weighs notable gravity to be addressed and thus should be attended accordingly. Police job is fundamentally crucial to the well-being of any nation, management of civil rights and deployment of law appropriately. Bangladesh Police devotes a round the clock service to public order, peace and security. It works relentlessly to secure life and property of the people. The enormous area of responsibilities and the volume of works of Bangladesh Police entail activities ranging from domestic law and order management to performing globally with the UN in its different peacekeeping missions (Bangladesh Police, 2018). In respect to all of the previously mentioned activities, Bangladesh Police has made exemplary contribution, numerous times. On the other hand, here in Bangladesh too, like other countries, police are sometimes accused of unwanted activities time to time. These activities are contradictory to the legal as well as legitimized role of police personnel. Such both positive and negative actions shape the credibility, acceptability and most importantly trustworthiness of police among mass people. Considering the significance of this force’s roles towards nation, it demands immediate attention to identify the influencing factors and thus, to rationalize police behaviour at professional work. The general objective of the study was to identify factors and to measure the extent to which the identified factors influence police personnel’s behaviour in professional work. In this study, through identifying police personnel’s (Inspector, SI, ASI, and Constable) behaviour at professional work and police perception about professional behaviour at work; relationship of different influencing factors to professional behaviour of police at work was attempted to establish. The extent to which different factors influence the
professional behaviour of police at work allowed proposing recommendations against gathered findings.

For primary data collection two divisions were randomly selected, namely Barisal and Rangpur.  The participants were selected randomly from the list of available police in different thana of the districts. Districts covered under Barisal division were Barisal, Pirojpur and Jhalokathi whereas districts covered under Rangpur division were Rangpur and Nilphamari. Prior to primary data that was collected using both qualitative as well as quantitative tools (detailed in the methodology portion), secondary data had been collected and analysed through intense desktop research covering several books and journals. Using Cochran’s Formula (as given below) to determine sample size, considering proportion (p) value as 50%, the sample size for each division has been calculated as below:

At confidence level of 95% keeping 5% error margin, this formula gives the sample size per division as 380.7. 10% additional sample has been taken to cover a non-response which generates sample size per vision as 423. For total study covering two divisions, the total sample size hence became 423*2 = 846.

Table 1: Sample distribution of the study.

A survey utilizing semi-structured questionnaire conducted on 846 police personnel rank of constables to inspectors from the Barisal and Rangpur division. It has also conducted 8 focus group discussion (FGD), 6 key informant interviews (KII), and 5 case studies to achieve the object of the study.

Data have been triangulated at every stage of this study using qualitative as quantitative tools. Through initial KII, professional/ acceptable and unprofessional/ unacceptable behaviours have been identified which later on was validated through questionnaire. Again, all the data received through questionnaire has been triangulated through data collected through FGD, KII and Cases.

More than 90% of the total 790 respondents (Inspector, SI, ASI, and Constable) participated in the questionnaire agreed upon the following police personnel’s behavioural elements to be professional or unprofessional at work (Table-2).

Table 2: Police personnel’s behaviour at professional work.

About 70% of the total respondents claimed that it is not possible for officers of their level to perform professional or acceptable behaviour always at work place (Table-3).

Table 3: Police Perception about Professional Behaviour at Work.

Different factors like education of police personnel, right prediction during work, sufficient facilities to attend duty, age of service seekers and economic condition of service seeker etc. came to the top list of factors identified factors by the respondents that enables police to perform professional behaviour at work place (Table-4). Factors like excessive working hours, influence of upper ranked officer or colleagues or mass public or political and family people, lack of facility to attend duty, lifestyle, wrong prediction during work and power of service seeker (accused) etc. were identified by respondents that leads unprofessional behaviour at work place (Table-5).

Table 4: Causes of enabling professional behaviour at work.

Factors like less work hour, physical fitness, normal expectation of civil society or mass people upon police etc. were chosen by respondents as top factors influencing professional work by police personnel at work. Factors like long working hour, insufficiency of service benefits other than salary, acceptance of pressure for unprofessional work at crime spot etc. were chosen by respondents as top factors influencing unprofessional work by police personnel at work (Table-6).

Table 5: Causes that leads unprofessional behaviour at work place.

Factors like less work hour, physical fitness, normal expectation of civil society or mass people upon police etc. were chosen by respondents as top factors influencing professional work by police personnel at work. Factors like long working hour, insufficiency of service benefits other than salary, acceptance of pressure for unprofessional work at crime spot etc. were chosen by respondents as top factors influencing unprofessional work by police personnel at work (Table-6).

Table 6: Extent to which different factors influence professional behaviour of police at work.

From the KIIs and FGDs conducted in this study, the following themes were revealed described as below:

Nature of Work Related Factors

This theme drew the issues related with professional work of police personnel (Inspector, SI, ASI & Constable) that impacts their professional/ unprofessional behaviour a work. At one FGD session held in Rangpur division, one respondent mentioned about interruption at work. That particular respondent mentioned about interruption caused both externally as well as internally. Supported immediately by other respondents, he mentioned about force’s internal and sometimes implied pressure that is created by mostly superiors to manipulate performance especially in case of investigation. Although, such interruptions are usual created by external bodies like political people as that person mentioned and all of the respondents agreed with this statement. Such issue came in some all the FGDs and KIIs conducted during the study. Also, another respondent of another FGD conducted in Barisal division mentioned about force‘s cooperation where, he particularly mentioned about hierarchical cooperation in both top down as well as bottom-up way. Supported by the other participants, this came from other FGDs too. Other major work related factors came under the facilities group mostly mentioning availability and scarcity of many different benefits and resources necessary for proper conduction of professional work thus ensuring professional behaviour. Such factors included salary and other benefits like accommodation, posting, accessories and resources necessary to perform professional work etc. However, the final KIIs conducted with senior ranked officers (ADIG rank) detailed about the current scenario even more and triangulated such themes which have been described at chapter five.

Personal Characteristics of the Respondents

This theme came from the responses of both respondents of lower ranks (Inspector, SI, ASI & Constable) as well as higher rank (ADIG) drawing issues defining rank wise generalized characteristics of respondents participated in this study which also impact their professional/ unprofessional behavior a work. Starting from the lowest rank belonging respondents (Constables & ASIs), feedback came from this group collected through FGDs and KIIs concerned mostly about benefits and resources provided in service. Understanding their current career position within force with the realistic career progression scope, it is quite understandable and therefore natural for them to be concern about the benefits and others, especially when it is compared to the senior ranked officials. Their thrive for these benefits came through FGDs over and over again. Secondly, in case of Inspectors and SIs, the concern came more regarding work related issues. These officials actually lead to do the field level jobs and therefore, it is quite normal and predictable of them being more concerned about practical duty issues like work conditions (i.e. freedom of work, internal and external cooperation, etc.). Responses collected from this group through FGDs and KIIs reflected this theme at almost all cases. Finally, through the KIIs conducted with senior ranked officers (ADIG rank) expressed more maturity and holistic view of this rank which portrayed their characteristics in professional work. At one KII session, the respective officer detailed all the claims that came from lower ranked personnel with references, examples and logical explanation. The holistic view of this person clarified the situation even more which helped to understand the characteristics of lower officials even more. In another KII session, the respondent added the strategic view of force addressing the titled mentioned issue which enlightened about their knowledge level too which of course developed eventually through years of service experience.

To Ensure Professional/ Acceptable Behaviour

Suggestions came through questionnaire responds regarding activities to ensure professional/ acceptable behaviour of police personnel at work. Top recommendations are given below:

• Salary Incretion
• Holiday/ leave enjoyment ensure and incretion
• Increase of other financial benefit/ allowance
• Reduced Working Hour
• Accommodation facility

Also besides these suggestions, incretions of facilities like accommodation, logistics and transport, ration, food, medical facilities etc. came too.

To Prevent Unprofessional/ Unacceptable Behaviour

Suggestions also came through questionnaire responds regarding activities to prevent unprofessional/ unacceptable behaviour of police personnel at work. Top recommendations are given below:

• Make police department free from political influence
• Reduced working hours
• Holiday/ leave enjoyment ensure and incretion
• Education
• Salary incretion.

This is to be noted that suggestions of holiday and salary came in both the list which actually emphasizes its importance over

Police work can be divided into two broad types, ‘Reactive’ and ‘Proactive’ (Ashby and Tompson, 2015). Reactive policing activities include calls for service, reports of crimes in progress or having occurred, and other requests for action. Proactive activities include the stopping of people who appear to be behaving suspiciously, patrols of crime hotspots and operations against groups like suspected drug dealers. Although the categories overlap, reactive policing accounts for the majority of officers’ time (Ashby and Tompson, 2015).  According to B. Sandhya (2018), Additional Director General of Police, Indian Police Service, Kerala, behavioral aspect and behavioral health of police never got any attention. Rather significance was always given to physical fitness. As she asserted, Presumption was always that all Police Officers are mentally strong. They are trained to cope with any situation. So, there is no need to see the mental health condition as a matter of concern (Sandhya, 2018). Unlike the recruitment of armed forces where psychological test is used commonly, such hasn’t yet introduced in case of police recruitment. Such issues clearly represent the need for initiative to be taken to assess behavioral health of police force members. Consciousness of psychological and behavioral health of police personnel is rising in other countries too. In Singapore, according to the Annual Report of Singapore Police Force 2018, Following the Police Scheme Review 2016, the SPF, together with the Ministry of Home Affairs Headquarters embarked on another review to further enhance the Home Affairs Uniformed Services (HUS) Scheme. The HUS Scheme Review concluded in late 2018, with revisions to the scheme subsequently implemented in January 2019. The review ensures that officers are competitively compensated for the challenging nature of their work and are given greater support for the different milestones in their lives? (Singapore Police Force Annual, 2018). Initiatives like developing police force members with training and other learning facilities are being taken to ensure their readiness to survive after retirement. HR dialogue, constant psychological support for force members is also practiced in Singapore police force. Police officers are powerful actors in society given their authority and they are always situationally correct (Bittner, 1970). Authority relations between individuals and the police, however, do not occur in a vacuum. Turk (1969) argues that face to face contacts between the police and individuals get played out depending upon the relative status characteristics of each actor. For instance, the police are more likely to expect defense from the young, poor people, and people of color. Similarly, Blumer’s (1958) group position thesis focuses specifically on the impact of subordinate racial status on attitudes towards the police. He argues that People of Color have less favorable attitudes towards criminal justice institutions, including the police, because they see are seen as a visible tool perpetuating their subordination and ignoring their interests in favor of the dominant racial status in society (Gossett, 2009). As literature shows, training creates competent leaders through self-improvement, self-motivation, and self-confidence. It’s not what leaders’ do that’s important- it’s why they do it. Leadership is a motivation (Slap, 2010). Co-worker cooperation internally and among different police divisions and departments externally was found to be very important for effective policing in study conducted on Thailand Police (Carr and Maxwell, 2017). Counselling, a method of treatment/ therapy widely used in psychology, has been since ancient era. Started to be used formally after World War 2 initiated at USA, counselling has played quite a successful role in the history of the world. To highlight importance of such and its usefulness in police force, example could be given by Singapore or Hong Kong police force. Singapore police started its ‘Para Counselling’ service at police force since 2001 (Singapore Police Force Annual, 2018). In Hong Kong, police have a distinguished group under personnel services and staff relations branch named ‘Psychological Services Group’ aimed to provide professional counselling and educational services to force members (Hong Kong Police Force, 2018). Even in India, our closest neighbor country, Government has decided to hire stress counsellor for Indo-Tibetan border police (PTI, 2018). According to Edward R. Maguire as mentioned in his book ‘Criminal Justice Theory: Explaining the Nature and Behavior of Criminal Justice’, factors influencing police personnel’s behavior could be summarized broadly under into three segments: sociological, psychological and organizational (Maguire, 2015). According to Donald Black’s theory of law, quantity of law is influenced by the social attributes of concerned parties: victims & suspects or plaintiffs & defendants as well as the social controls of themselves (Maguire, 2015). Sociological factors might include social status of police personnel, values and norms followed etc. The second approach as described by Edward, here variation of police personnel is highlighted with focus to their behavioral predisposition. In addition to find the homogeneity of behaviors with audiences, psychological traits of personnel (like ‘Authoritarian’) too is examined here. Organizational practices, practices and others have been covered under this category. According to Sherman (1980), Riksheim and Chermak (1993) factors that explain police behaviors could be divided into four categories: situational, individual, organizational and community. Situational factors include the characteristics of the suspect (e.g., race, sex, age, demeanor, etc.), characteristics of the victim (e.g., race, sex, age, relationship to the suspect, etc.), characteristics of the situation (e.g., location, number of bystanders present, etc.), and legal characteristics (e.g., presence and amount of evidence, seriousness of the offense etc.). Individual factors refer to the characteristics of individual officers that may influence their behavior (e.g., officers' sex, race, age, attitudes, education, training, etc.). Organizational factors include any characteristics of the police organization that might influence police officer’s behavior (e.g., administrators' preferences, formal and informal policies, departmental size, levels of supervision, etc.). Community factors include public expectations and preferences, crime rates, demographic characteristics, political characteristics, etc. According to Ivkovic (2005) as published at the article titled ‘Fallen Blue Knights Controlling Police Corruption’, causes and correlates responsible for police corruption includes three factors broadly: individual, organizational and external or society wide factors. Individual factors included different issues that might corrupt a police officer if available at his/ her individual level. Propensity towards corruption is arguably the fundamental cause that might lead to corruption conducted by any police officer. However, this factor is not static. Rather it is generated person to person based upon his/ her own personal and work environment. Prior experience too plays a significant factor over here. At any given moment, a person can choose between committing a crime and not committing it… The consequences of committing the crime consist of rewards… and punishments; the consequences of not committing the crime… also entail gains and losses. The larger the ratio of the net rewards of crime to the ne rewards of non-crime, the greater the tendency to commit the crime (Wilson and Herrnstein, 1985). The above statement, therefore, clarifies the cost-benefit calculation’s impact over conduction of any crime. This very logic is applicable a personal level too for police officers. According to the authors, police as an agency itself has some influencing factors liable for corruption. Such factors include: The police agency as a paramilitary bureaucracy: Despite being a civil force, the organizational practices like chain of command as well as work nature, police as an agency is a practicing place for military like bureaucracy. Impact of such mixtures often causes scope to abuse power issued to police by the state and thus, creates corruption conducted by officers. Like in other agencies, authority in police too may interfere into processes like recruitment, training, organizational ethics standard etc. Such issues create scope for authority to have its impact over members of the agency and thus create a substantial influence over police members. Like the earlier mentioned issue, resources allocated to police by state are initially received by the agency and then distributed and disbursed by authority. Therefore, this too creates a loophole that might intrigue corruption. For being different than any other civil services because of unique job nature, code of conducts for police officers applicable inside the agency differ sometimes than that applicable to other general civilians at other organizations. Therefore, absence of proper clauses against corruption creates scope for such. A pivotal factor that will definitely cause corruption unless done properly. Peer influence led by organizational practices is at core important and thus easily influences any officer for right/ wrong conduction of professional duty. Addressing the military sort nature of work environment, influence of supervisor is therefore extremely high in police compared to other civil sectors. Therefore, with a corrupt supervisor, high chance of corruption prevails over respective unit members too. Factors like officers perceived lower salary; barrier for career enhancement creates a motivational/ influencing situation for conducting corruption. Police officers too are members of society and therefore are heavily influenced by the norms of the society. For example, in highly corrupted countries, it is taken for granted that like many other agencies, agencies like criminal justice system and police too will conduct corruption which actually legitimizes police corruption and thus, influence for conduction of such at an increased rate. Presence, absence or level of influences of external entities like different pressure groups play a key role over the situation strictness for police officers to ensure their performance. Such issues, therefore, have key influence over police personnel’s behaviors like corruption.

Police roles in present times vary by duties. They play the role of peacekeeper, law enforcement and many other activities. They face and are bound to take moral decisions on daily basis. Moreover, they often need to handle crucial conflict of interest. Being under the microscopic observation of authority as well as the civil society and pressure group, police work is one of the toughest jobs in any country. Despite the above mentioned difficulties, Bangladesh Police has successfully served the nation since its independence. Even during the liberation war of our country, it is police force who first acted to the call of nation by resisting the invader military troops in our territory. However, during the glorious years of service excellence too, fingers have been pointed out to the police force of Bangladesh for different reasons time to time. Most of the times, they grossly accused police for unprofessional conduct. Understanding the significance of this force as mentioned earlier, this study approached to find police force’s perception regarding professional behaviour, possibility to behave professionally at work every time, factors causing professional/ unprofessional behaviour and factors influencing the such behaviours and also the intensity to that. Finally, recommendations were derived from the respondents. After conduction of the whole study, all such invaluable findings have been presented in this report for required action for this elite force. Last but not the least, careful selection of instruments with proper implementation of such, improvement of Bangladesh police force’s performance is expected in time which would help our nation in thousand ways. Suggestions which can be implemented by police independently to prevent unprofessional behaviour: appropriate training; free from corruption and crime; fair promotion; award/ recognition; zero interference during work; free from political influence; and work near home district.

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