Adding to the sense of safety provided by SHE teams and Bharosa support centre, as many as 47 female cops will be patrolling city streets from now on, as part of ‘Women on Wheels’ initiative launched by the Hyderabad police on Monday.
The newly inducted bike-borne constable officers will be on city road to instil a sense of confidence among women and curb street crime.
The all-women patrol squad was launched by City Police Commissioner Anjani Kumar, Additional Commissioner of Police (Crimes and SIT) Shikha Goel and actor Mehreen Kaur Pirzada, with an aim to give more visibility to women officer in the department.
The constable officers will work on a par with their male colleagues in the emergency response, crime prevention and community policing, said Ms Goel.
“This is the major step towards mainstreaming women constable officers in the department,” she said, adding that they have undergone two months of intensive training in bike riding, unarmed combat and other defence techniques. The event was also marked by the scintillating defence techniques exhibited by the women cops and Mallakhamb performance by male cadets of TSSP, that drew applause from a large number of audience, including several aspiring police officers and college girls.
Around noon, the Goshamahal police stadium was fired up as the spectators were amazed to see the officers riding their four gear machines with a pillion wearing a headgear too.
“By putting them as the proactive front of policing, we want to provide an additional safeguard to women while they are on streets or in any public transport and also motivate more women to join the force,” Hyderabad Commissioner of Police Anjani Kumar said.
Mr Kumar said that 7.5 % is the national average of women in the police department, which is very low. “We are conducting special recruitment drives for the past few years.”
Intensive training
The officers, who knew scooter riding were selected and given specialised training in riding motorcycle with gear at Traffic Training Institute in Goshamahal.
A team comprising five traffic police personnel trained the women for more than four hours in a day for 60 days in two batches. “The training started after the transport department officials issued Learning Licence and after two months they had a driving licence for a motorcycle with gear,” said TTI Inspector G Harish.
He said that training for morning batch was between 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., while second batch started at 2 p.m. for next three hours.
“Initially, they rode the bike in the areas where the traffic volume was low and later on the high volume streets,” he said.
In the next phase, more teams will be introduced with at least one for each police station in the city. They would be integrated with the Blue Colts functioning at police stations, Ms. Goel said.