“Tu raatra bhar basun kaay kaam karte mala kaay mahiti (I don't know what work you do sitting here whole night),” said a woman police constable. The statement, which sounded almost as an accusation, could embarrass any woman. But, when it came from a woman constable, it seemed outrageous. I was subjected to this humiliating statement on Thursday night at about 1 am while sitting at the Dadar Chowpatty with a male friend who is also a journalist.
We had just returned after having dinner and were sitting at Shivaji Park Chowpatty before heading to our respective homes. Five minutes into the same, a few policemen attached to the Shivaji Park police station, including a woman constable approached us asking us to leave. Our fault Sitting at the sea face post midnight.
We introduced ourselves and told the policemen that we were journalists and wanted to know which rule prohibited us from sitting at the sea face. At this, the woman constable who was later identified as Khurshid S. Shaikh, turned to me, and said, rudely that she didn’t know “What kind of 'work' I would do here the whole night. Understanding what she was hinting at, I got angry and told her she had no business talking to me in such a manner. The other male constables supported her. When I asked the constable her name, she refused to give me the name and only did so after I called up the senior police inspector of Shivaji Park police station Gangadhar Sonawane.
While Mr Sonawane agreed the statement and behaviour of the woman constable was “not right,” the constables continued arguing with us. The police inspector deputed for night duty soon reached the spot and after hearing us out said, “These things happen in arguments. Let it go.”
When I asked if he knew what the constable had meant, the officer smiled and said, “We deal with many such men and women and hence something like that might have been said.”
When we said we would report them to the authorities, the policemen huddled together. They said they would make a diary entry of the incident and proceeded to ask us our names, numbers and address. While we were providing them with the details, we turned and saw a constable was video recording the incident. None of the policemen could tell us why the incident was being shot. This reporter then messaged police commissioner D.D. Padsalgikar detailing the incident and the video recording. When the Commissioner messaged in the morning that the DCP had been informed, this reporter approached Paramjit Singh Dahiya, DCP, Zone 5. We filed a written complaint regarding the same, he said, “We are looking into the incident seriously. Inquiry has been initiated and strict departmental action will be taken if any misdemeanour is found.”
