Hyderabad: The concept of ‘Women on Wheels’ was launched on Monday by the Hyderabad city police, which focuses on curbing sexual harassment and ensure women’s safety.
“The aim of the initiative is to involve women personnel in patrolling duties to prevent crime and engage them for community policing and emergency duties. Later, they will be integrated with the Blue Colts,” said Additional Commissioner of Police, Shikha Goel.
“The women cops will patrol the streets during the day and reach out to victims in distress. So far, women personnel were confined to police stations to attend to complaints or assigned to bandobast duties during rallies, protests and public gatherings.
We want the women/girls to do all duties that the men do at the police station level,” said the official. that in the last two months, they learned driving, unarmed combat techniques and other techniques.
The Police Commissioner of Hyderabad, Anjani Kumar IPS said in the last four years, many initiatives towards empowerment of women in society were taken up, including the Bharosa Centre and SHE teams.
“A national movement is developing from Hyderabad. This branding got a good name for the Telangana police and attracted police and judiciary from other States who visit and study the concept. We have become a role model for all States,” he said, citing a survey which said women in the police department are 7.5 per cent.
In Telangana, over the last three years, a special drive was on in the department to have 30 percent of women officers.
“There were fields like maintenance of law and order, traffic, VIP security, investigation and technical investigation or IT initiatives, in which women need to acquire specialization. We will help them with advanced learning modules,” he said.
In conclusion, Ms. Goel said that the newly recruited women police constables have been drafted for the Women on Wheels wing. “For now, every division will have one team to patrol the jurisdiction and attend to calls. As the numbers increase, it will be extended to the police station level,” she said.
