Peace bonds: How Chennai City police kept 4,500 Offenders in check

This, is apart from carrying out regular prosecution procedures and preventive detentions, including booking the offenders under the Goondas Act, by the police to reign the suspected criminals.

“The offenders execute peace bond promising to behave for a year and if they break it, they would have to go behind bars for the rest of the period,” a senior police officer said. So far, this year, 4,533 offenders signed such bonds and only 32 of them broke it. “This year, only 32 had gone to jail after breaking the bond,” an officer noted, adding that only less than one per cent of the offenders break the bond and land up in jail. Of the 32, as many as 30 were habitual offenders.

Though the judiciary is not directly involved in the process, offenders will have to go to jail if they break the bond. The police in Chennai use their executive magistrate power to force offenders to sign the bond. “Usually we issue a summons to the person concerned, who can come with a lawyer. But the final decision rests with the Deputy Commissioner,” a senior officer said, indicating that the offenders have not much option other than signing the bond. This is a relatively new power, which Chennai police had received in 2014. They call ‘peace’ bond cases as security cases. In Chennai Ambattur police district, peace bond had been brokered with 208 offenders in the current year followed by 152 in T Nagar district and 150 in Mylapore district.