The Hindu : Kerala / Thiruvananthapuram News : Victim support cells at police stations

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Wednesday, Sep 26, 2007
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Kerala

Kerala - Thiruvananthapuram

Victim support cells at police stations

Staff Reporter

As part of community policing initiative

Panels to be formed to check illegal activities
Complaint boxes to be placed at public places

Thiruvananthapuram: The city police will soon set up victim support cells at local police stations as part of the Government’s community-based policing initiative, Janamaithri Suraksha Project (JSP).

Official sources said that Station House Officers (SHO) had been asked to enlist the support of charitable organisations, public spirited lawyers and social workers for helping juveniles in conflict with law, sufferers of domestic violence, victims of sexual assault and also families of suicide victims.

Special committees will be formed at the police station level to check illegal activities, such as unauthorised sand-mining and granite quarrying that degrade the environment. These committees will include students and environmentally concerned citizens.

They will help create public awareness on issues such as vector control, pollution of water bodies, dumping of plastic and garbage disposal. The police will also organise programmes to train students in disaster management.

It will place complaint boxes near ration shops, post offices, bus stands, railway stations and educational institutions. The policeman walking the beat will be responsible for clearing the boxes.

The SHO will ensure that the complaints are properly followed up.

The police will give special accent on tackling crimes against women. It will enlist the support of members of the government’s poverty alleviation mission Kudumbhashree for this purpose. Beat officers will hold meetings at the neighbourhood-level to understand the problems faced by women in the locality. They will organise legal awareness classes for women.

The police will train citizens, including students, who are willing to work free as traffic wardens for an hour or more every day in their locality. They will be given special uniforms and badges.

The wardens will help the police regulate traffic, mainly in front of educational institutions. The wardens can also help the police and other State agencies carry out location-specific traffic management and accident prevention studies.

The police have asked beat officers to identify “low occupancy” houses, particularly dwellings of senior citizens and NRI families (where the wage earner is working abroad).

The beat officers will regularly cover such houses and help the inhabitants make their homes crime proof. They will also carry out checks on strangers.

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