BHUBANESWAR: The safety and security of women in the Capital has once again come under scanner after a CCTV camera caught a miscreant thrashing a woman on Monday morning.
The woman, Banita Tripathy of Rayagada, was returning to hostel from the railway station when the miscreant put a knife to her throat and manhandled her. The victim, who works in a private company here, had returned from her home. She was going to her hostel in Acharya Vihar when the accused intercepted her at about 5:40 am. The CCTV camera installed in the hostel captured the entire incident.
She approached the Commissionerate Police and lodged a complaint in this regard on Tuesday. Saheed Nagar Police registered a case and launched a search for the miscreant. The city cops are also investigating if it was a kidnapping bid or a snatching attempt.
Bhubaneswar DCP Satyabrata Bhoi said, they are also investigating whether the miscreant has any past enmity with the woman, who told the cops that she does not know the man.
On September 2, two separate cases of chain snatchings were reported at Saheed Nagar police station. While two bike-borne miscreants snatched chain from an IT professional’s wife and fled, a West Bengal native was nabbed for snatching chain from another woman.
Similar incidents were also reported from Chandrasekharpur and Kalpana Square areas. Not in the distant past, an employee of I&PR Department was robbed at Station Square which prompted the cops to place a subordinate policeman under suspension.
The fact remains that despite getting more patrol vehicles, there has been very little improvement in policing in the Capital. In most cases, the patrol vehicles are seen parked by the road side at fixed spots with the teams sitting inside even as hoodlums are seen roaming the roads without giving a damn to the cops. Commercial sex workers are seen soliciting customers near the District Police Office late in the night.
The road blocks set up by the Commissionerate Police have become so predictable that those who want to avoid checking know how to evade and take a detour through the by-lanes, laying the entire exercise to waste.Besides, the number of CCTV cameras installed by police as well as the local residents has multiplied but still, the anti-social elements are not deterred.