BENGALURU: Following the success of city NGO Janaagraha’s community policing initiative with the Bengaluru City Police (BCP), the latter is now scaling the programme to all 108 police stations, in order to improve safety and build trust between police and neighbourhood communities. According to a spokesperson from Janaagraha, this makes Bengaluru the first major city in India to have a city-wide community policing programme. In December last year, the NGO had proposed the inclusion of the initiative in the Karnataka Police Act. It currently runs with the help of volunteers, who are called Area Suraksha Mitras (ASM), and coordinate with 18 police stations. A community policing event was held yesterday on Friday at the Police Headquarters.
Dr ST Ramesh, former DG-IGP, Karnataka, delivered a centralised training programme to all Community Liaison Officers (CLO), who are expected to train their staff and the ASMs in their station’s area on community policing. They will recruit around 30 ASMs, who along with beat officers will support them in implementing the programme. They are expected to organise outreach programs in neighbourhoods, such as door-to-door awareness, beat-level awareness in public spaces, organised awareness in institutions and blood donation camps, marathons and so on.
A Jana Suraksha Samiti will be constituted in each police station area comprising the CLO, beat officer and all ASMs of the area, and is expected to meet once every month to discuss neighbourhood issues. “Eventually, the initiative will become their project, with the CLOs selecting ASMs from among the residents. ASMs function as the eyes and ears of the police, and raise awareness among residents to reduce crimes in the locality,” said Mahalakshmi B, associate manager of digital marketing at Janaagraha.