From shorts to trousers: How police uniforms evolved in Mumbai

Why do the police not wear shorts?" five-year-old Ethan from Surrey, England, had asked Lisa Townsend, the police and crime commissioner of his county in a handwritten letter two years ago. "It is because they often have to kneel down to help someone, or even run after a criminal through a field where they may be stung by nettles and other spiky plants, so they need to keep their legs covered," Townsend wrote back. Had the question been posted to retired ACP Iqbal Shaikh of Mumbai, he would likely have given a similar reply. He belongs to the sepia time when city constables wore blue half-pants that often hindered movement while chasing criminals. "It was difficult to command respect or chase criminals when your uniform became a liability," says Shaikh. "The constables were mockingly called ‘Pandu mama'."

Once the norm in many tropical nations spanning Singapore to Sri Lanka, as well as islands like Jamaica and Fiji, the shorts-clad urban cop, it seems, is now a globally endangered species spotted chiefly around beaches or on bicycles in certain countries (see box).

Not too long ago, the NYPD, too, updated its dress code, banning shorts on transit beats to maintain cohesion and professionalism. Against the backdrop of rising mercury levels, this global shift prompts a relook at the evolution of the Mumbai cops' uniform, which went from blue half pants to khaki trousers in 1981.

"Neeli Batli, Peeli Buch" ("Blue bottle, Yellow cork")—as the city constables' blue uniforms with yellow caps were once famously known —first surfaced in the early 19th century. S M Edwards' book ‘Bombay City Police—A Historical Sketch (1672-1916)' mentions that it was in use as early as 1838. Armed only with an umbrella, the Bombay cop appears in the 20th-century wearing billowy blue half pants in a famous 1903 postcard painted by the legendary M V Dhurandhar. "Policemen wore blue until 1905 after which white uniforms became the standard for ceremonial occasions," says historian Deepak Rao.

When the British left in 1947, the blue billowy half pants—which used to be tucked into knee-high woollen ‘pattis' (bandages)—were shortened. Later, even as cops in other states transitioned from shorts to full pants post-Independence, city police held on to the colonial blue short pants, taking "immense pride in the fact that the shorts had been modelled on the same pattern as the London police force", says an earlier report in TOI. However, as years passed, the constable increasingly became an onscreen caricature, embodied by the likes of Marathi comic actor Dada Kondke in the 1975 film 'Pandu Hawaldar'.

Off screen, too, the shorts drew ridicule. "At the time, gang wars were rising and it was humiliating when criminals got away in many instances because the loose half pants of the constables would get stuck in objects along the way while chasing," recalls Shaikh. The thick blue full-sleeved shirts didn't help matters. "They were impractical in our humid weather," adds Shaikh referring to the sun that made the blue fabric fade quickly, adding to maintenance costs.

By the 1970s, city police faced calls to modernise. In 1978, a review committee approved a switch to khaki trousers, which became mandatory by Oct 1981 under then CM Abdul Rehman Antulay. By the time Rohidas Dusar joined as a traffic cop in the 1980s, only a handful of the older cops were still wearing shorts. To Dusar, now a police historian, the khaki trousers reflect not just a sartorial shift but also the evolution of policing. Though 72-year-old Dusar has a soft spot for the erstwhile ‘patti' that protected cops who have to stand for long hours from varicose veins, the retiree doesn't think half pants warrant a comeback. "Most of the current generation of constables are graduates," says Dusar. "They would not want to look like Pandu Hawaldar."