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Police Academy - Part XVII
By Cecil Pinto


More than twenty years back, in 1984 to be exact, a Hollywood movie was released named "Police Academy". It went on to spawn a whole lot of tasteless sequels, but that is not the point here. The simple basic premise of the original movie was that in some unnamed city, to increase recruitment numbers, standards were lowered for entry into the police force. This led to a whole bunch of good hearted but incompetent misfits entering the Police Academy. And then the fun began. As the tagline for the movie claimed, "The new police recruits. Call them slobs. Call them jerks. Call them gross. Just don't call them when you're in trouble!"

Coming back to Goa and the present. Recently I saw a strange series of advertisements in the papers involving recruitment of women police constables for the Goa Reserve Police Force. The initial advertisement mentioned a minimum height requirement of 168 centimeters. A few days later it was reduced to 165 centimeters. A few days later another advertisement reduced the height requirement to 160 centimeters. What's going to be the final recruitment height at this rate? Midgets? "Drop your gun and place your hands on the counter!". "Where are you? I don't see any police?". "Here! Hello! Look down here!". Talk about Goa police doing under the table deals!

 "Hello is that the In-Charge of the Goa Police Women's Academy?"

"Yes. How can I help you?"

"I would like to know why the height requirements have been dropped for the women constables."

"We have sixty posts to be filled and only thirty applicants met the height requirements. The posts have to be filled. Therefore the decision."

"Do you plan to drop anything else to fill these posts?"

"What are you trying to suggest?!!"

"I mean are there any other physical criteria that you will be reducing for applicants? I presume there are no mental requirements anyway."

"We are planning to drop the long jump and high jump criteria too. Women constables don't do much jumping here in Goa."

"Indeed. Our MLAs do enough of that! What exactly do women constables do? I see only men constables on night patrolling and traffic duty."

"Women constables are used when there is a law and order problem involving mixed-gender or women-only crowd. Primarily their duty is to hang around looking bored when there are protests by the Bailancho Saad."

"Bailancho Saad has that many protests?"

"Sure! At the drop of a hat, whether a crime was committed or not, if a woman is involved they hit the streets with a protest march. Then the women constables have to keep aside their crotchet and fish-price-comparisons for a few hours."

"Why is it that most women constables look ill-fed whereas the average male constable looks well fed?"

"Really, I didn't notice that. I'm quite well built. Of course my rank is PSI."

"I'm not talking about Inspectors. Why is it that all police women below the rank of ASI are, in general, very thin? Will they be able to intimidate criminals without looking tough?"

"They can intimidate using psychological techniques we teach them. When criminals see our women constables are always gossiping among themselves, it intimidates them. They assume our women constables are gathering intelligence about criminal activities through the gossip network. Seeing women bonding excites normal men, but intimidates criminals!"

"How come male constables have to have a minimum chest measurement while there is no such criteria for women constables? Isn't this gender discrimination?"

"We dropped the chest criteria after there were misunderstandings over the actual chest measurement process. Do you go under or over? If you know what I mean..."

"You still have not answered my question about why women constables look ill-fed, unlike their male counterparts"

"It is a question of opportunity. You see male constables are sent on foot patrolling. They get to seize edibles and beverages from roadside hawkers without anyone protesting."

"You mean grab and steal don't you?"

"No I mean seize! The hawkers have to be punished for selling without proper licenses. How else will legitimate restaurants make money to host parties for our superiors' birthdays?"

"That probably explains why as one goes up the havaldar-ASI-PSI-DySP ladder one sees a proportionate increase in the size of the paunch."

"What nonsense. We have a well-equipped gym at Altinho that any Inspector can use. Unfortunately time spent there cannot be logged as duty-hours, or it would be packed and alive, and not collecting cobwebs as it is now."

"One last thing. Is knowledge of Marathi essential for joining the police force?"

"No not at all. Why do you ask?"

"Every time I have filed a complaint in a rural police station I talk in English, the havaldar repeats the complaint in Konkani and writes it down in Marathi. Why?"


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The column above appeared on the 17th of November 2005 in Gomantak Times
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