various mechanisms-political, legal and administrative. Setting up effective accountability mechanisms requires a delicate balance between control and initiative. In the UK, there are 43 police forces with a tripartite system of police accountability. In the US, there are 17,000 police forces each under the control of their respective elected local government. The complex task of balancing control over the use of police powers and the need for operational autonomy has led in India to the proposal to divide police functions into prevention, investigation and service provision. The police perform different functions and accountability is required for each. It was proposed that the entire police service should be restructured so as to have two separate agencies dealing with ‘investigation’ and ‘law and order’ with separate accountability mechanisms. Further, the need was stressed for the setting up of independent District and State Police Complaints Authorities (PCAs) to look into allegations of human rights violations and also an Independent Inspectorate of Police as in the UK to establish a system of rigorous inspection of police stations and the functioning of police officers. The inspectorate would also look into recurrent incidents of dubious deaths in ‘encounters’ with the police. These proposals are yet to be implemented. Key issues related to police’s image in South Asia remain to be addressed. In India, a gap between the Constitutional imperatives and the inherited criminal laws and procedure, which give rise to the enduring unpopularity of the police Inherited provisions of the Indian criminal laws are too preoccupied with maintenance of security of the state, public order and collection of political intelligence. Investigation and detection of criminal offences have been provided secondary importance. Police officers at all levels need to be sensitized to human rights. The National Human Rights Commission in India has stated that 60 per cent of all the arrests made by the police are either