When police stations across the State were struggling with the first lessons in community policing, those in the city were already writing poetry in it.
Even when the top officials were finalising the guidelines for the Janamaitri Suraksha Paddhati, the community policing initiative being implemented in the State, the City Police were fine-tuning its implementation in its police stations.
Officially, the city has only three police stations – Palarivattom, Gandhi Nagar and Fort Kochi – where Janamaitri is being tried out at present, along with 17 others across the State. But then Janamaitri was officially launched just a year ago, while the Police Residents Association Initiative in District Ernakulam (PRIDE), an interface for the police and city residents, will celebrate its fourth anniversary soon.
The attempt to establish a platform for interaction between police and city residents started in 2004 under the initiative of then City Police Commissioner Dinendra Kashyap. It was called Crime Alert Programme or CAP, which was soon rechristened as PRIDE.
Over these years, PRIDE has succeeded in ironing out the differences between police and public and was instrumental to a great extent in bettering the public image of the police. On their part, the police could also fine-tune their work by following the direct feedback from the public.
During all high-profile meetings, the City Police gets a mention these days given the often-quoted statistics of a 35 per cent reduction in crime rate this year compared to last year. “This mood is reflected in the PRIDE meeting. What we did basically was to address the main areas of crime in the city. Thus we could bring down thefts, especially during night hours,” said Manoj Abraham, City Police Commissioner.
The monthly meetings of PRIDE (held on every second Saturday) used to go on for a couple of hours, with representatives of residents associations coming with long list of complaints. “Now, the meetings are over in just about 30 minutes, as complaints are mostly on traffic issues or issues that need to be attended by agencies like Corporation, KWA or KSEB,” said Mr. Abraham.
The success of PRIDE has triggered a movement for city residents to be more organised. “According to statistics available with us, there were 354 residents associations in the city in January 2008. This has crossed 500 now,” said P.K. Gopalakrishnan, general secretary of Ernakulam District Residents Associations Apex Council (EDRAAC).
Residents being more organised would ease the load on police. That was one reason why, the City Police could initiate steps like combined night patrolling, well before Janamaitri was conceived. Residents associations in areas like Ponnurunni and SRM Road continue to support the police in their fight against crime, as they used to do four years ago.
On the flip side, the recent rise in the number of residents associations has started affecting the functioning of EDRAAC. Along with PRIDE, the Apex Council had established interactive platforms with the district administration and the Kerala State Electricity Board. “These works were done on a voluntary basis and we are now finding it hard to manage so many members with such an arrangement,” said Mr. Gopalakrishnan.
The police are also feeling the pinch. “It is not that we have brought down instances of thefts and we can go slow on that front. We should keep up the vigil on that front and widen the scope of community policing. We have now brought in the drive against terrorism to the fold of community policing and will soon include new age crimes as well,” said Mr. Abraham.
On their part, the police are encouraging residents associations to come up with innovative competitions and campaigns to spread the messages – be it against terrorism or use of narcotic drugs. Both the police and residents association officials realise that the key to success in future is maintaining the tempo.
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