Bhubaneswar: The Capital city will soon have two Deputy Commissioners of Police (DCPs) if the state government approves a proposal of Commissionerate Police regarding the bifurcation of the Bhubaneswar Urban Police District. The Commissioner of Police, Satyajit Mohanty, has sent a proposal in this regard to the Director General of Police RP Sharma July 15.
Speaking to Orissa POST, Commissioner Mohanty said, “Since the creation of the Bhubaneswar UPD in 2008, the city has witnessed rapid growth in its population attracting citizens from other parts of the state as well as outside. Consequently, the number of vehicles in the city too has increased rapidly. “Keeping the burden of the maintaining law and order in the Capital city in view, we have proposed the bifurcation of the UPD as well as some police stations having large jurisdictions,” he explained.
The population of the city increased from 10,99,615 in the 2001 census to 13,67,552 during the 2011 census. Subsequently, the criminal activities in the city too rose significantly during this period.
The number of registered vehicles registered with the two RTO divisions in the city also increased from 39,873 in 2008 to 1,06,011 in 2016. The Capital city has also been witnessing frequent congregation of persons from across the state at different times of a year for various protests, especially during the Assembly sessions and various international events.
At the same time, the Commissionerate Police have proposed that the DCPs of the proposed Bhubaneswar North UPD and Bhubaneswar South UPD each would look after 11 police stations currently under the Bhubaneswar UPD.
According to the proposal, Bhubaneswar North UPD would comprise Chandrasekharpur, Chandaka, Nayapalli, Nandankanan, Infocity and Khandagiri till Jatni police station limits, while the core city area from Capital Hospital, Kharavela Nagar, and Balianta till Dhauli would be under Bhubaneswar South UPD.
Mohanty said that apart from establishing a new DCP office of South Bhubaneswar UPD, there will be no extra burden on the state exchequer for resources. The existing DCP office building will be the office of the DCP of north Bhubaneswar UPD, while land for the South Bhubaneswar DCP will be decided only after approval of the proposal.
He said that the proposed bifurcation would increase the efficiency of the DCPs as they would have smaller areas under their respective jurisdictions.
Meanwhile, after the bifurcation of the Khandagiri police station, the Commissionerate Police have been mulling to divide other police stations with large areas under its jurisdiction, such as Mancheswar, Sahid Nagar and Laxmisagar police stations.
