Political Science · Political Institutions in India
UGC NET Jan 2026 Political Science
Which Act led the foundation of a modern police bureaucracy in India?
ARegulating Act of India, 1776
BGovt. of India Act, 1935
CIndian Police Act, 1861 ✓ Correct
DBritish Indian Act, 1801
Correct answer: (C) Indian Police Act, 1861 — The Act that laid the foundation of a modern police bureaucracy in India was the Police Act of 1861, which is option (3).
Explanation
★The Act that laid the foundation of a modern police bureaucracy in India was the Police Act of 1861, which is option (3).
★The Police Act of 1861 created a uniform and centralised police system across British India.
★It was framed on the recommendations of the Police Commission of 1860, appointed after the Revolt of 1857.
★The Revolt had exposed the weakness of the existing policing arrangements and prompted a thorough reorganisation.
★The 1861 Act established the office of the Inspector General of Police at the provincial level and a hierarchy down to the district and station.
★The District Superintendent of Police was placed under the general control of the District Magistrate, linking police and civil administration.
★This structure became the basic framework of policing in India and survived largely unchanged for over a century.
★The option Regulating Act of India is wrong, since the Regulating Act, passed in 1773, dealt with the governance of the East India Company, not policing.
★The Regulating Act had created the office of Governor General of Bengal and a Supreme Court at Calcutta, but it did not found a police system.
★The option Government of India Act 1935 is wrong, since it dealt with provincial autonomy and a federal scheme, not the creation of the police.
★The option for an Act of 1801 is wrong, since no such foundational police legislation is associated with that year.
★The 1861 framework is administered today alongside later reforms and the model Police Acts proposed in recent years.
★The Indian Penal Code of 1860 and the Police Act of 1861 together formed the backbone of the colonial criminal justice system.
★The Code of Criminal Procedure, first codified in the same era, completed this legal structure.
★For NET, fix the Police Act of 1861, based on the 1860 Police Commission after the 1857 Revolt, as the foundation of the modern police bureaucracy in India.
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