Campion, David Andrew, “Watchmen of the Raj: The United Provinces police, 1870--1931 and the dilemmas of colonial policing in British India”, Ph.D. thesis, University of Virginia, 2002, 292 pages; AAT 3044903. Brief summary.

“This … traces the development of the Indian Police Service (IPS) and the goals and methods of colonial policing in the villages and towns of the United Provinces of Agra and Oudh, one of the largest and most important regions of India during British rule. The central argument is that it was the inefficiency and weakness of the colonial British in their policing methods rather than the brutally effective use of police power that fueled resentment and resistance among the population of colonial India. Throughout British rule, colonial officials maintained a tenuous hold on the reins of power (i.e. the police) … (T)he Indian police existed to ensure public safety--a function that required public cooperation. Yet, it also served to enforce the coercive political order and privileges of the colonial elite--a function that presupposed antagonistic relations between the state and the people. The simultaneous execution of these two incompatible functions … constituted the central dilemma in the policing of colonial India… reflected in the anger of the public and the frustrations of the officers themselves, revealed many of the contradictions and much of the ambiguity of Britain's imperial mission in India. The day-to-day actions of the police became the primary source of resentment against the colonial state among the overwhelming majority of India's population during British rule. Yet throughout this period, the police remained the most important link between Britons and Indians and the most frequent conduit for cultural and social exchange as well as a point of bitter conflict.” From the abstract.