PONDA: The Ponda police station is facing difficulties to deal with rising crimes due to a shortage of sanctioned staff.
The current staff posted at the police station often have to attend to VIPs and also bandobast duties. The citizens have urged the government to post additional staff to the police station.
The Ponda police station has a vast jurisdiction covering areas of almost four Assembly constituencies namely Ponda, Shiroda, Marcaim and Priol as well as the panchayat areas of Dharbandora and Usgao-Pale, which are part of Sanvordem and Valpoi constituencies respectively.
A rising number of cognisable cases are mostly reported in the industrial estates of Usgao, Marcaim, Bethora and Kundaim. Apart from handling criminal cases, the police staff are deployed for programmes of political leaders happening at least thrice a week. The personnel are also sent to courts, ministers’ houses, senior police officers’ homes and other venues keeping their regular duties aside.
All this is having a negative effect on investigations which are delayed in the filing of charges and much to the annoyance of complainants.
A few years ago the government announced new police stations at Mardol, Shiroda and Dharbandora. The proposed police station at Mardol was supposed to be inaugurated on December 19, 2020, but the construction work of the new police station is still underway.
The process for the proposed Dharbandora and Shiroda police stations is yet to be initiated.
