What many DIGs and SPs in their stints here could never do, DGP Jharkhand D K Pandey has ben able to accompolish along with his team of top cops. They spent two days and one night at infamous Dagra Police Station in Palamu.
Dagra is a synonym for naxals fear, threat, violence, but with the recent setting up of police station at Dagra this script here is set to change. For police Dagra was like a forbidden territory in the past as police officers used all alibi to ward off or put off any visit here. Reason was obvious.
DGP D K Pandey, ADG (Spl Branch) Anurag Gupta, IG (STF) R K Dhan, Harilal Chouhan IPS and others were here on Monday and Tuesday.
Anurag Gupta said, “We came here by road. We wentback to Ranchi by air. Our road journey here showed us the ground realities of this place.”
Dagra is a highly strategic location from the point of view of naxals movement and shelter. Sources said because of its proximity to Bihar, naxals of Bihar used to venture out here as their pasture.
Locals said scores of men, women and children gathered in the sun to hear their DGP. The gathering was too happy to find one police station there at Dagra which had to languish for 33 years in the past to have this institution there, said sources. The DGP said, “Naxals throw spanner in developmental works here. They have so far squeezed the development of this area. They used to coerce and intimidate the people here. It was their writ here that ran all these years but now we have our thana here at Dagra and one Bhengra has been made in-charge of this police station.”
He further said, “We will curb and contain any influx of naxals from Bihar. Their era of atrocities is to end now. There will be now development here.”
“We have set our priorities here for the local populace. There would be now works in the domain of education, health, drinking water & sanitation, electricity, road and other infrastructural facilities here, he further added.
All in the name of connectivity here are two broken bridges. With the coming up of Dagra Thana now people can dream of developmental schemes taking off here as because of 3 decades old extremism here residents had learnt to live under the command of the naxals only.
“As the extremism in Palamu is on the wane people come out in hordes and welcome people in uniform which just ten years ago was very different when people used to run away sighting any police wallah as they then used to trust this ‘nayee sarkar’ (read extremists) most,” a local said.
People said that the DGP did not sell any moon nor did he promise any moon he said what the gathering wanted development and development and he is determined to take it down there with civil administration’s initiative.