Chowkidar to be back in Bengal

Colonial hangover!

The long forgotten “Chowkidar”- a village guard mainly working as the informer to the police of the British era is all set to be back in the villages of West
Bengal as Mamata Banerjee government has sent an order to all district administrative heads to recruit one “Chowkidar per Gram Panchayat” by the end of this month.

According to recently issued government order, the state government is all set to introduce “Chowkidars” newly termed as “Gramin Police Bahini” (Village Police Force) for improving the relation between the police and people, gather information and maintaining strong vigil in all the 3,351 GPs of the state.  

“The government order has been sent to all the SPs’, the Commissioners of the four newly formed Commissionerates, the DMs, the BDOs and the SDPOs of nearly all the districts, and they have been asked to recruit one person per Gram Panchayat,” a
senior Home Department official told Deccan Herald.

“The process of recruitment should be completed by the end of this month so that they can start working form August,” the officer said.

“The persons will be appointed on contract basis at the rate of Rs 310 per day with a maximum of 22 working days in a month including two paid holidays. The person recruited will have to be below 30 years should have passed class X standard,” the official added.

“Apart from reporting the daily incidents like fire or accidents, they will also provide information if any aged person or a woman is being tortured,” the official said.

“However, the Chowkidars will be given two sets of dress and a batch but, they will not be provided with any weapon. If the area of the Gram Panchayat is very big, they might get a cycle,” the order said.

The proposal of introducing the system was taken during a meeting of the previous Left Front regime which is now being implemented.