The beat police in India are very poorly trained. Their equipment is not up to snuff. I was just talking about this very issue with my brother in India — he was relating a conversation he once had with a policeman. The gist of it is that the cop is made to wear some heavy boots (weighing some I don’t know, 20 pounds and the culprit is barefoot and this cop lugging the 25 lb boot has to chase after that guy? Even though they had guns I do not know how well they were trained to use it. They may also be caught off guard (understatement) and I don’t quite know what was going through their minds — could they be thinking they need orders from higher ups? But all I can say is that they are not trained for this kind of situation. Maybe they should be but it all comes down to resources and India after all its corruption and such, does not have much to invest in infrastructure, I guess.