KOCHI: In the wake of recent murders in the city, the police have decided to strengthen enforcement activities. As part of this, the police will be conducting a survey of people who are running tea shops and other businesses in the night. The decision follows reports that these wayside eateries and teashops functioning till midnight have become the hub of drug trade, which has mainly resulted in the recent seven murders in the city police limit.
Speaking to TNIE, City Police Commissioner C H Nagaraju said a survey will be conducted to monitor and keep a tab on the people visiting these places. “We are going to survey the people who are running roadside eateries in the city. The survey will have questions like how many people work for them, how much money they get, how they survive, how many people come to eat usually, do they appear normal and how do they reach the eateries.
This will help us keep a tab on such persons. We don’t have the opinion that all people who are visiting these eateries are drug abusers, but there are some drug trade happening in these areas. Due to the presence of people in such areas, these become a market,” said the commissioner. He stated that the data will assist the police in monitoring areas that require more attention.
“All recent murders in the city have happened out of sudden provocation. Aggression is a problem. It may be because of drug abuse. We don’t want to entertain such behaviour. The police force is actively monitoring the activities of the public,” the commissioner added.
The police have also decided to strengthen night patrolling in the city following the recent murders that earned Kochi the bad name of being a centre of crimes. “Generally, these incidents happen during the crime windows. Crime windows are mainly a time period when the presence of police officers on the field will be thin. Usually, this happens during the change in shifts. We have already identified the crime windows and decided to carry out special patrolling during that time. Patrolling will be beefed up in the early morning, late evening, night and afternoon, apart from normal patrolling,” the commissioner said.
Meanwhile, the police are also planning to approach the civic authorities to restrict the time when public spaces remain open. “We will approach civic bodies to restrict the timings and functioning of wayside eateries. Normally, there is no night-time restriction in the city. But when we analysed the profile of the people involved in the violence, we found that most of them were coming to the night shops to have liquor and drugs. Under the cover of this, drug trade is also being carried out,” he added.