Lalitpur Metropolitan City get proper barracks for first time in 20 years
Lalitpur Metropolitan City (LMC) has finally started constructing a three-and-a-half storey building in Damkal, Pulchowk, for its 22 municipal police officers, after two decades of the force’s establishment.
Lalitpur Metropolitan City (LMC) has finally started constructing a three-and-a-half storey building in Damkal, Pulchowk, for its 22 municipal police officers, after two decades of the force’s establishment. Until now, the police had been conducting daily operations from a single dingy room not big enough to fit even five people.
Information officer at the LMC, Rudra Prasad Gautam, said an estimated Rs50 million has been allocated for the construction of the building and the expenses will be taken care of by Nepal Reconstruction Authority’s Central Level Project Implementation Unit.
The Municipal Police (MP) was established during the tenure of former mayor Buddhi Raj Bajracharya in 1998, with 30 constables manning 22 wards. Today, the sub-metropolitan city has turned into a metropolitan city (since February 2017), with an addition of seven wards, but the number of City Police personnel has decreased to 22, with more and more people leaving, as they are forced to work beyond their capacity from a congested single room.
Talking to the Post, Mayor of LMC, Chiri Babu Maharjan, said the city police will be transferred to the new building within this fiscal year. “They will have their separate barracks. Once they have a place to live and dine in, the metropolis’ actions will be more effective,” said Maharjan. He also said the LMC is in the works of hiring 50 additional MP in the metropolis. The MP officials have long been complaining of their office being like “a prison”. At present, the city police are operating from two rooms with corrugated zinc plates for a roof. One room is being used by Maharjan, while the other is crammed with 22 city police officers.
After the Post carried out a story on the “sorry plight” of the LMC’s city police on November 30, the metropolis on December 14 laid the foundation work for the building of the structure.
“This is good news for us, but right now we are still compelled to work from just two rooms in this shivering winter,” said the chief of MP and Deputy Superintendent of Police Kadam Lal Maharjan.
The LMC, which is in charge of 29 wards of the metropolis, is the third largest city in Nepal after Kathmandu and Pokhara.
Anup Ojha is a reporter for The Kathmandu Post primarily covering social issues, crime, and human interest stories since 2011. Before moving to the social beat, Ojha covered arts and culture for the Post for four years.
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