With close to 2,300 personnel currently handling the task of managing movement of nearly 30 lakh vehicles in the city every day, traffic police are bound to be an exhausted lot. However, if a recent proposal reaches fruition, their strength would be upped by nearly 50% or 1,000 personnel in the near future. For, the department is set to get a dedicated division of traffic home guards soon.
The proposal is currently under consideration by authorities at the home guards department. This move will not only boost the traffic cops’ strength, but will also remove certain administrative hurdles, said officials. They also added in hushed voices that isolated incidents of home guards assuming powers of uniformed policemen will be better controlled with this.
Having such a dedicated division of home guards will prove effective for the city traffic police, said HG Patel, additional commissioner of police – traffic.
He added, “It is a good proposal from the administrative perspective. Not only will the strength of traffic police personnel in the city be augmented but the creation of a separate division of home guards will also lead to specialised training for them.” This training will better prepare them for the task of traffic management, Patel added.
The city traffic police currently have a few over 500 home guards to assist them daily.
“We have selected around 800 home guards from the 19 divisions available here, including a mahila (woman) division. Of these, around 500 personnel man traffic posts under the supervision of cops in two shifts – 250 per shift,” said Brijrajsinh Gohil, senior divisional commander for home guards – traffic branch.
However, with the home guard being a voluntary service for citizens and professionals, not all personnel selected for traffic duty were able to give time for the eight-hour shifts, he added. The selection for the proposed new division would take into consideration the ability to devote the specified time as well, said Gohil.
Supervision needed
Majority of these home guards used to be posted at traffic junctions in periphery areas of the city until recently. However, there were isolated reports of some of them misusing their powers and pretending to be policemen. Some were even brought to book for such incidents last year. It should be noted that the traffic police were augmented with such a dedicated division during 2005-06, which was later shut due to such unwanted instances, said sources.
After the incidents of last year, senior police officials ordered for them to only be posted at junctions within city limits, and under supervision of traffic cops, they said further. Authorities had even issued notifications to prevent citizens from being fleeced. Such incidents may be better controlled with training and recruitment of only suitable candidates into the new division, sources added.
Proposal awaiting nod
Meanwhile, the proposal remains to be approved by the home guards department. When contacted, director general of civil defence, home guards & ex-officio commandant general of home guards, Gujarat, HP Singh said, “We have received the proposal for the dedicated division from Ahmedabad traffic police, and it is currently under consideration.”
At the same time, home guard officials have also begun a recruitment exercise wherein close to 40,000 applications were received till February 14. Sources said that at least 25,000 of these candidates would be eligible while over 12,000 may reach selection stages. The 1,000 recruits to be added to the proposed division may well be selected from among these, said an official on condition of anonymity.
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