Safety of women is top priority, says police chief

Prateek Chauhan

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, January 11

Its alarming to know that 90 per cent of criminals in the city are first timer, said Commissioner of Police Amulya Patnaik in his annual press conference here today. He said women safety is a priority for the Delhi Police in 2018.

Heinous crimes have shown a dip, said the Commissioner of Police while elaborating the achievements of the department in the last one year. He said now the police focus more on prevention rather than reactive policing.

The consistent preventive endeavour of the police has led to a healthy reduction in heinous crimes by 23.43 per cent in 2017 and street crime has come under control with a sharp decline in robberies and snatching by 21.05 per cent, he said.

But when asked that snatching incidents have been reported consistently everyday and the residents these days having fear in mind coming out of their homes wearing jewellery and holding mobile phones in their hands as they fear of been robbed, the Police Commissioner said the graph shows that there is a decline which is quite evident.

He said the priorities before the department leadership during the year were clearly delineated which were bring about visible improvement in the police presence, tone up the service-delivery mechanism to enhance the confidence of complainants, cater especially to the vulnerable sections and enforce zero tolerance as regards staff aberrations.

On women’s safety he said, “It was our priority focus area during the year. Under the banner of Sashakti, extensive self-defence training was imparted to around two lakh girls in 2017”.

Other initiatives like high police visibility in vulnerable areas, introduction of women patrols, Shishtachar and Nirbheek coupled with large scale cyber awareness campaign in schools also yielded encouraging dividends, he said.

“We realised that woman safety issues would urgently necessitate a multi-pronged strategy inclusive of mindset reformation, constant liaison was kept with civic authorities apprising them of dark and lonely stretches in the city, and a social awareness campaign was also launched in the form of “Run for Ladli”, he said.

Woman beat officers were inducted of boosting up policing in vulnerable areas, he added.

The Special Commissioner of Police, RP Upadhayaya said 2,23,075 cases of the IPC have been registered during 2017. The yardstick for crime per lakh of population used worldwide to compare crime has been taken into account. 

Total crime per lakh of population during 2017 was 1,263 in comparison to 1,137 during 2016.

Security of senior citizens remained important in 2017 which was achieved through regular contact with senior citizens by the beat officers and conducting security audit of the residences of senior citizens. 

People from the Northeast region who are found to be most vulnerable groups have given designated special officers and regular meetings with them were held to ensure their security, Upadhayaya added.