A day-long training for Friends of Police organised by the Police Department was envisaged as a mechanism to involve the public, particularly the student community, to promote crime awareness and prevention.
For the last decade, FOP, signifying Friends of Police, Friends of People, Friends of Principles, Friends of Pupils, and Friends of Poor have been sharing policing power and responsibilities. In Erode district, there are 200 FoP members bridging the gap between the Police Department and the public, Superintendent of Police M.R. Sibi Chakravarthy said after initiating the training programme conducted by the department on a periodic basis.
The mutual interaction helped the participants understand social issues and problems better. The Police Department perceives such programmes as advantageous since they enable free flow of information from the public. The FoPs, the police believe, perform their tasks with a sense of belonging and responsibility, helping the department to distinguish between the vast majority of law-abiding people and comparatively smaller number of law-breakers who have to be dealt with an iron hand.
The FoPs have been instrumental in creating the confidence in the public to approach the police without fear whenever their help is required, officials say, adding that the programme also reminds the supervisory officers that they have to evince keen interest in involving the public in policing and making the arrangement long lasting.
Only those with no involvement in criminal case are permitted to function as FoP members and given identity cards, with a caution that their membership will be withdrawn in case of misuse of the privilege. Besides crime prevention, FoPs are also involved in anti-vice campaign, victim assistance, information, night beat, patrolling, and traffic assistance, the organisers say.
Participants encompassed 200 FoPs and 50 police personnel. Resource persons were drawn from Erode and Tiruchi districts, the SP said.
Additional SPs K. Gunasekaran and L. Balaji Saravanan, and other senior officials addressed the participants. The programme ended with a yoga session.
