IPS officer Shweta Chauhan's motto for service to people brought her into policing and her empowering initiatives are changing the narrative in Delhi Police
New Delhi, March 14
In 64 years of the history of Delhi Police, a woman IPS officer has been supervising central district, a sensitive district of Delhi Police. IPS officer Shweta Chauhan has been changing the narrative of the policing in central district of Delhi Police with strict law and order and heart touching initiatives for policing while empowering the women police personnel in her district.
IPS officer of the 2010 batch, Shweta Chauhan is DCP Central in Delhi Police. In an interview with BW Policeworld, DCP Chauhan speaks on the initiatives and policing in her district.
1) What inspired to take up policing, normally labelled as a challenging profession for women?
I always looked up to the women in uniform. It was a dream to wear khakhi and be a police officer and do something for the society. I didn’t know I will get an opportunity in policing. I wanted to make a change in the society and makea difference. I was a lecturer earlier which is a different contribution to the society. I chose to follow my dream and decided to take up IPS as policing touches more lives and help citizens in distress from all walks of life. The impact of helping people is more and even now after taking this up I feel there is so much to do for the citizens as police officer. There is nothing difficult for women be it any professon. In fact in policng, many times women are better than men.
2) You supervise central district an area in Delhi that has Jama Masjid, Daryaganj, Hauz Qazi and big retail markets with lakhs of people visiting the spots. What are the steps you took to ensure law and order in the central district?
The central district has both market areas and sensitive areas of Jama Masjid where there are pockets that are communal and sensitive. The citizens come from all walks of life visit these areas for businesses and purchases. We work on both fronts here from developing intelligence network to active public police interactions to maintain peace and harmony. The police have been trained to keep an eagle eye as well maintain harmony by involving more local citizens with us. The patrolling on two wheelers in these areas is strong and we ensure every pocket is covered by the patrolling team. The women police in fact have been trained into patrolling in these areas and regularly interact with both traders and citizens to ensure the day to day activities are smooth. We also engage the citizens to come to police events to boost community policing.
3) You introduced Veera Squad for women police in central district. Tell us more about the squad.
the name ‘Veera’ was chosen from the word Veer (brave). Going by the name of the squad, we decided that the women police in the district would be involved and engaged in active roles of patrolling and ensuring law and order as brave police women taking up challenging assignments. Active policing requires picketing and patrolling. We wanted to increase the visibility of women police on the ground. The idea was to first empower these women personnel so that they further empower the women in the district by ensuring law and order. We started building self-sufficiency in them, got them intro riding into two wheelers. The Veera Squad patrols in sensitive and highly crowded areas of markets, parks, bus stands and outside education institutions.
4) The Delhi Police set up first pink booth in Central district in Karol Bagh police station. The central district took a step ahead and set up pink booth in the red light area. Tell us more about this special pink booth that has garnered lot of appreciation.
This pink booth has been set up Shraddhanand Marg in Delhi which is a red light area. This is vulnerable group. The women here don’t have access to many basic amenities, education or job opportunities. They are often exposed to exploitation. The pink booth was specially set up here. It works as both as facilitation booth run by women for women and we have converted into training school for sex workers. The vocational training is given to sex workers who want to get out of that occupation and take up other jobs.
We are doing three month short programmes of stitching and sewing who want to take up tailoring. We have got enrollments from girls here to work as health care workers. The girls who have basic education are being trained to do jobs in nursing home and medical facilities. A computer centre is also set up here for basic computer training. One of the girls I met here is a Graduate and she is being trained into doing better jobs. We are also educating the children of the sex workers who are being trained into regular school syllabus and computers besides their online classes. Our approach is to uplift the area and give more access to this segment of society.
5) Several women police personnel expressed that you have been very motivating and encourage them thoroughly. You started ‘Prashakti’ programme for them. Your thoughts on this.
I am happy to hear that the women police in my district have felt like this. We all should be very encouraging to each other. Like my seniors have trusted me and entrusted responsibility, it has motivated me to work more. Similarly, I want to instill that confidence and trust on the women police in my district to go out like men. Women are not weaker in any sphere. In fact in some cases they are been better than men. I always tell them that this is a job that you have got out of hardwork and you can do wonders as a police official. You be an example for you family, community, village and every person in the society and work towards their goals.
We have also introduced regular courses for them to strengthen them further. We are teaching them how to drive, regular Yoga and fitness for their own wellbeing, self-defense techniques that can help them further train young girls and women in the district. We also train them regularly in unarmed training not just to catch criminals buy stay abreast with their counterparts.
6) As DCP (Recruitment) in Delhi Police you had busted a major recruitment scam. Tell us more about the impersonation fraud during the police exam.
Job in policing is coveted and lakhs of people appear for it. The exam takes place in three phases and this fraud was witnessed in the first phase of the recruitment.
16 lakh of people appeared for the exam and 70000 odd were selected for physical test. This was happening during the peak Covid time. We had set up multiple layers of scrutiny and checking. During the checking we found out some candidates were having different photographs then the person who appeared for the test. We understood this a scam and people were charging money to commit these frauds for the candidates.
It was happening in two ways where at some places people had charged money to impersonate and write exams and the actual candidate came for the test. In another case, they had changed the photograph while the real candidate appeared for the test and come for the physicals. We had biometrics and taken photos at the time of the written tests too which they didn’t know. At many places the photos during the written didn’t match with admit cards and the whole scam was exposed. We even took legal action against the candidates.
Shweta Chauhan served in the Arunachal Pradesh Police before getting posted as DCP (Recruitment) and then DCP (Central) with the Delhi Police. DCP Chauhan has been very focused on strengthening women police personnel in the force and often engages with them at both personal and professional level to aide and support them.
Her brainchild to convert the pink booth into a training centre for sex workers and their children garnered appreciation from several state and UT police department who have taken inspiration from this initiative to take up similar programmes in their states and districts.
DCP Chauhan received Delhi Commissioner of Police’s commendation disc in 2021 for her outstanding work.
