Chandigarh: Haryana today asked the Centre to sanction an India Reserve Mahila Battalion to deal with women agitators and also sought financial and technical support for modernisation of the state’s police force. Speaking at the 11th meeting of the Inter-State Council chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and held after 10 years, Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar sought funds to purchase equipment for regional forensic science laboratories.
“The state government has adopted a transparent policy for the recruitment of constables and inspectors, and the process for hiring 5,000 general duty male constables, 1,000 constables under the ex-servicemen category and 1,000 women constables are in progress,” he said.
As a result of this, he said, the percentage of women in police would increase from six to eight and thereafter, within a year, “we will increase this percentage to 10”. The state government has set up women’s police stations at all district headquarters. “Women complainants are more comfortable in narrating their grievances before women cops and majority of them want their problems inquired into at women’s police stations. “Encouraged by the response, we have recently taken a decision to open help desks at all police stations at the sub-division level to expand their reach,” Khattar said. “The Centre may consider sanctioning India Reserve Mahila Battalion for law and order duties in Haryana,” he said, adding Haryana had faced a lot of protests, which included women agitators, due to its proximity to the national capital. He said the state was in the process of establishing a state-level cyber crime branch in Gurgaon which will have specially trained experts. — PTI
