Police chowki or a stop-gap arrangement?

Rajiv Mahajan

The successive state governments have set up half-a-dozen police chowkis in lower Kangra areas, adjoining Punjab border, but have failed to notify these even after years of their functioning. 

As a result, the requisite police posts could not be sanctioned to run these police chowkis. For the past several years, the Police Department also failed to construct proper buildings forcing these chowkis to run as a stop-gap arrangement only. The staff deployed at these chowkis is being shifted from different police stations creating shortage of police force. Sometimes, cops are deployed from Police Lines, Dharamsala, to run these chowkis. Intriguingly, the previous Virbhadra Singh government had notified the upgrade of Fatehpur chowki to a police station, but failed to sanction posts. At present, this police station is being run with the deployment of staff on deputation only.

The police chowkis at Kandwal, Gangath and Rehan were set up under Nurpur police station jurisdiction in November 2005, April 1995 and December 1997, respectively, and made functional. Similarly, Thakurdwara and Rey police chowkis in the present Fatehpur police station jurisdiction were made functional in 1978 and December 2016, respectively, and Nagrota Surian chowki was set up under Jawali police station in 1993. These chowkis were made functional without the requisite sanction by the then state governments, on verbal orders of the higher ups after the recommendations of local politicians. Due to this, no regular personnel could be appointed. The Police Department, too, is unable to construct buildings for these chowkis and, at present, these are either being run from local gram panchayat bhavans or from small rented rooms. The Nurpur and Indora sub-divisions are in the border areas of Himachal and Punjab, hence the crime rate (especially NDPS cases) is very high here in comparison with other police stations in Kangra district. 

Demand for DSP office in Nurpur gains momentum

The demand to set up the office of the District Superintendent of Police at Nurpur is also gaining momentum, for which local MLA Rakesh Pathania had raised this issue during a public meeting of the CM during his visit here.

Intriguingly, the area under Kandwal police chowki connecting two bordering states (Punjab and Himachal) is known for drug trafficking, illegal mining and entry of suspicious elements to the hill state. It has been crying for attention for the past many years, as neither the infrastructure has been strengthened, nor regular police force has been deployed here.

Following the demand of local MLA Rakesh Pathania, Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur, during his maiden visit here on March 3 last year, had sanctioned a police chowki at Sadwan near here. Recently, this proposed chowki has been notified along with the sanctioning of requisite police force and staff. The state government has also upgraded Damtal police chowki in Indora sub-division to police station and also sanctioned posts for this purpose. 

There is persistent demand to regularise all unsanctioned chowkis in lower Kangra district. Significantly, the issue of notifying unsanctioned police chowkis in lower Kangra area, most of these on the inter-state border, is being raised in the district crime meetings for the past several years, but the successive state governments have not taken it seriously.