MADHYA PRADESH: Cops turning actors for annual cultural events is not new, but how about men and women in khaki donning up the role of actors to ensure free, fair and peaceful elections.
Tum Raho Sajag — a 45-minute documentary made by the Madhya Pradesh Police Academy in Bhopal as part of the larger exercise by the state police’s training wing to tutor the election-related field machinery for the November 17 assembly elections — served as the ideal audio-visual tool to educate government servants working for the peaceful conduct of polls.
The docu-drama featured real-life cops — from the ranks of constables to the deputy director of the Madhya Pradesh Police Academy, Malay Jain — essaying variegated reel-life roles, including those of candidates, cops, supporters, voters and eve anti-socials.
The video covered all possible dos and don’ts related to polls — spanning from filing of nominations by candidates to the day of polling and counting; from prevention of defacement of public and private property to acting against anti-socials disturbing poll meetings, and seizures of unaccounted cash, drugs and other freebies during static and mobile surveillance.
The documentary directed by Jain (who is also a novelist) and Bhopal-based filmmaker Narendra Sahu, was inspired by a similar short film made by ex-MP police officer and theatre artist Dr Fareed Bazmi around two decades ago.
“The docu-drama made by the MP Police Academy was a structured and well-defined exercise. It rendered entertaining and educative material to ensure that training imparted in different phases to various poll-related staff (constables, home guards, forest guards, SP, DIG, IG, ADG and Special DGs) was supported with a ready-reckoner,” said Anuradha Shankar, the additional DG (training) of MP Police and the state’s nodal officer for election training.
“Making the film with all possible technologies, including drone cameras and 4K video cameras, for the first time, that too while checking exam papers of newly recruited constables and the passing out parade, was quite an onerous, but exhilarating task,” said Malay Jain.
Not only did Jain direct the docu-drama, but also essayed the role of an SP in the film, where the district collector’s role was played by additional SP Shraddha Joshi.
“It was a team effort of 25-plus staff of the Academy. Facilities of state police were used, including turning the model police station at the Academy into Adarsh Nagar police station in the film, and turning part of the Academy’s hospital into a polling station,” Jain added.
“Memories of the film being screened in front of more than 1,500 police personnel at the Ravindra Bhawan Auditorium in Bhopal will remain etched in our memories forever,” Jain beamed.
When the Election Commission of India bestowed the task of training the poll machinery on the Madhya Pradesh Police, the training wing was assigned the role, especially with its experimental and novel practices being recognised by the Central government nationally with three national awards in the recent past.
“Training a massive government workforce would have been tiresome, but we took it as a challenge and went about it in a structured manner, beginning with development of a thorough training material, covering all possible aspects related to elections,” said Irmeen Shah assistant IG (training) at state Police HQ.
“In total, over one lakh staff was covered for election training by the MP police. The entire process, which has been conducted on such large scale by any police force perhaps for the first time in the country, will be forwarded to the Central government’s Bureau of Police Research and Development to be included among the best practices,” added Anuradha Shankar.
Appreciating the efforts of the training wing, the chief electoral officer of MP, Anupam Rajan, said, “Training holds the key to the success of any big exercise, particularly elections. And adding audio-visual material like a documentary drama makes the exercise more engaging, enriching and result-oriented.”
“The results are for all to see in the form of the all-time highest poll percentage of 76.22 (provisional currently), which couldn’t have been possible without comprehensive training of poll duty staff,” Rajan acknowledged.
But it’s not the poll percentage alone that reflects the success of the poll staff’s efforts. It has particularly led to an increase in seizure of cash, drugs, illicit liquor, precious metals and freebies since the elections were announced on October 9.
“The value of seizure that stood at Rs 340 crore was nearly five times more than the Rs 72 crore worth seizure during 2018 assembly polls. This speaks volumes about the hard work put in by our static and mobile surveillance teams across the state,” the Rajan said.