Panaji: Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on Friday said required infrastructure and IT facilities are being provided to the police department to strengthen policing in the state.
“The police department is working to ensure safe Goa. We have reduced the police response time (to distress calls) to 9 minutes. We are trying to reduce it further,” said Sawant.
He was speaking after flagging off 46 new four-wheelers at the police headquarters in
the city on Friday. The vehicles have been procured to strengthen mobility and response capabilities of the traffic police, highway patrol, district police stations and SPCR across Goa.
Stating that modern policing requires trained personnel, technology and reliable mobility, Sawant
said the new vehicles and officers will further strengthen road safety, field response time, crime prevention and public security across the state.
He also said police duty is to protect people and “if people dare to come charging at you, then the time has come to show such people what policing is”.
Sawant also gave appointment letters to 17 newly-appointed police sub-inspectors.
He told the newly-recruited PSIs that they had been appointed to serve the people of the state and should dedicate themselves to that service.
Director General of Police (DGP) Alok Kumar said the vehicles will strengthen policing by increasing the visibility of police on highways and important roads.
Kumar said the police response time to distress calls has come down to 9 minutes and, with the additional vehicles, “we expect to reduce the average response time to around 6 minutes, which will be one of the best in the country”, said Kumar.
Referring to the new 46 vehicles, Kumar said this was the biggest number of vehicles given by any government in one go since the inception of the Goa Police Department.
“These vehicles will be utilised for highway patrol, 12 vehicles will be stationed along the highway right from Patradevi to Canacona and Vasco to Mollem and Ponda towards Mollem. Each vehicle will cover approximately 20 km area and they will perform round-the-clock patrolling,” said Kumar.
Sanguem cops register FIR against GFP members
Curchorem: Sanguem police have registered an FIR against Goa Forward Party office-bearers Meshu D’Costa of Sanguem, Dattaraj Raut Desai of Assolda, advocate Viraj Nagekar of Quepem, Pritesh Kurdikar of Barajan and others.
According to the FIR, the accused persons assembled at the
police station and allegedly engaged in an aggressive confrontation with police personnel, issued threats, and obstructed police personnel while they were discharging their official duties.
The FIR further states that Kurdikar recorded the incident and circulated it on social media.
The District and Additional Sessions Judge, Margao, has granted the accused interim bail.