Maintenance of public order is a primary function of the state. Since early 19^th century police have emerged as the principal agent of order maintenance. There have been studies of police work of order maintenance in Western societies. However there have been few studies of public order events and police order maintenance in non-Western societies. This dissertation is an empirical study of public events and police response in a city in India.

The purpose of this study is to understand the different types of public events, how the police proactively and reactively respond to them, and to place the interaction in the context of democratic functioning in India. This study measures public order events by quantifying its various facets. Through analysis of a large number of public order incidents and police responses, the study spells out the relationships between events and police responses. These findings are then placed in the context of democracy in India. As research questions this is stated as- What are the types and nature of public order incidents? How do the police respond to public order incidents, and what is the relationship between the event and response? How do the event-response dynamics elucidate the larger democratic discourse in India?

The research questions have been addressed through a mixed method research design utilizing both quantitative and qualitative research methods. Quantitative analysis has been conducted through statistical analysis of all public order events and police responses that occurred during the period of a year in one city. Qualitative analysis has been done through case studies of major public order events that occurred in the city. This mixed method research design has the benefit of providing an overview of the larger trends in the population under study through quantitative analysis, and a detailed and in-depth view of the phenomena through qualitative study.

Public events in India have diverse nature. The characteristics of an event have an impact on the police response. Of the different characteristics the degree of violence in the incident has the greatest impact on police response. Moreover the response of the police is sequential and the earlier steps taken by the police have an impact on their subsequent actions. While the event response dynamics in general reflect the nature of democracy, it also has an influence on the democratic discourse.