Skip to main content

A Village Burnt Overnight: Tears, Loss and Survival in Dhamangaon Blaze

  Sitting amid the blackened remains of his home, 32-year-old Nikesh Gawali carefully broke open a half-melted plastic box with a screwdriver. His hands shook slightly, not out of fear, but out of hope. “I’m trying to find my daughter Aarti’s gold earrings,” he said quietly, still focused on the box. “She’s just five. I got them made recently after months of labour work.” The plastic box, warped and blackened by heat, was one of the few things left from his two-room house on the outskirts of Dhamangaon village . All around him lay ash, broken tin sheets and charred wooden beams. The walls had cracked under the heat and the front room’s tin roof had caved in completely. What remained was a blackened debris all around - almost nothing to suggest a home once stood there. Nikesh earns his living as an agricultural labourer, like many in the village. Work is uncertain and depends on the season. Those earrings weren’t just jewellery - they were a small dream, a reward for his hard work,...

City and District police gear up for tight vigil ahead of LS Polls

  • Flying surveillance squads and Static surveillance squads are formed 
  • Paramilitary forces to stage flag march at sensitive areas 

By Dheeraj Fartode
Nagpur City and District police are leaving no stone unturned to ensure safe and secure atmosphere during Lok Sabha election campaigning for Nagpur and Ramtek constituencies. 36 Flying surveillance squads and static surveillance squads have been formed in city and 28 squads have been constituted in district. These squads have already swung into action and have launched operation to put check on illegal activities and keep a tab on notorious history sheeters. The district has a total 4,034 polling booths including 2,224 in Ramtek and 1,810 in Nagpur constituency. A special meeting of personnel of the special squads was conducted recently and senior election officers guided the members about action plan.

Commissioner of Police K K Pathak informed ‘The Hitavada’ that additional bandobast of 1,200 home guards including 500 men, 70 API/PSI, a company of Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) have been granted for election bandobast for Nagpur Lok Sabha. The company of women company of CRPF has been received by the city police, he informed. 
As per the District election machinery, 28 booths are sensitive in city limits. According to the information, Lakadganj police station have maximum seven sensitive booths followed by six in Ajni, four in Lakadganj, four in Tehsil, three in Nandanvan, two in Ganeshpeth and one in Dhantoli. 
CP Pathak said that the number of sensitive booths has come down in city and flag march would be staged by Paramilitary force in the first week of April to boost morale of voters and to send a stern message to all anti-social elements about iron resolve of forces to foil any nefarious attempt to create disturbance during election and voting. 
Superintendent of Police (SP) Dr Aarti Singh informed that 1,920 polling booths of total 2,224 booths of Ramtek constituency are under Nagpur rural police. 
Election Commission has approved bandobast of 3 DySP rank officers, six Police Inspectors, 70 API/PSI, 668 policemen, 600 home guards including 100 women, a SRPF company and a Goa IRB. 20 booths in the district have been classified as sensitive including seven under Mouda police station, four under Khaperkheda, three under Saoner, two under Khapa police station, two under Veltur, two under Mouda, one each under Parsheoni and Ramtek police stations. 
Paramilitary force is likely to stage Flag march in the sensitive area on Wednesday. She further informed that 18 flying squads, 18 static surveillance squads and 10 check post at inter-state and inter-district borders are formed for surveillance. 
Additional SP Prakash Jadhav informed that the special squads are formed to keep a strict vigil and track movement of illegal arms, liquor and money. Police are also conducting preventive actions for safe polling in district police limits, he informed.  

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Srivastava's report one sided, Collector not to write ACRs of Superintendent of Police: DGP

By Dheeraj Fartode Maharashtra's Director General of Police (DGP) Pravin Dixit has rejected the report into the spat between Collector and Superintendent of Police in Bhandara, that had stirred hornet’s nest among the Indian Police Service (IPS) cadre in State. Principal Secretary (Revenue) Manu Kumar Srivastava was appointed by State Government to probe the matter and he had submitted the report to Government and made certain recommendations. One of the recommendation which Srivastava made was to delegated powers of writing annual confidential records (ACRs) of SP's to District Collector. This particular recommendation had the IPS cadre seething with anger as they claimed it an unwarranted intrusion on their powers. DGP Pravin Dixit DGP Dixit when contacted by The Hitavada to ascertain his views said he had read the report and found it to be totally one sided. Further he disclosed that the particular recommendation about ACR was also summarily rejected. Dixit said ...

IGP Prasanna : The man who stopped Obama’s convoy

IGP Mallikarjuna Prasanna By Dheeraj Fartode  Published on Feb/17/2019 NOT many are aware of an episode during the then US President Barack Obama’s visit to India in 2010. The world’s most powerful man was made to wait for 11 minutes in his car while an Indian cop took on American officials for their unwarranted interference in the US President’s security. KM Mallikarjuna Prasanna, Special Inspector General of Police of Nagpur Range, still continues to work with the same pride, wearing his patriotism on the sleeve. “Had they (Americans) deployed their personnel for area security, then the message would have been Indians are unable to protect VIPs in their nation,” recounted Prasanna on the episode that is one of the highlights of his distinguished career of a skillful investigator. The story of the IPS officer of 2000 batch is worth a film. In fact, a movie (Nagarjun-starrer ‘Officer’) has already been made by Ram Gopal Verma last year. His real life script als...

UP ATS arrest a doctor from Yavatmal district under anti-conversion law

On 10-08-21 Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) of Uttar Pradesh police arrested a doctor from Pusad town of Yavatmal district in connectin with a case registered at Gomti Nagar police station under anti-conversion law. It may be mentioned that three persons were arrested by UP ATS from Nagpur and Gadchiroli on July 17 in the same case. The accused person was identified as Dr. Faraz Shah Karamat Shah (27), a resident of Vasant Nagar, Pusad. A police official informed that Faraz was working with Shah Hospital at Pusad with his relatives after completing MBBS course from Government Medical College Akola in 2012. As per the records of Yavatmal police, Faraz was not a member of any organisation. The UP ATS had arrested some persons last month in Delhi and had claimed that a nation-wide racket of religious conversions was busted. The police had recovered a register with details of over 1,000 persons, including their names and addresses, from Maharashtra, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Haryana and Delhi. So...