In Ludhiana, dancing cops break away from stress, social distancing rules

While some had their masks on, others had them hanging down from their faces as many hugged each other, clicked selfies while breaking into Bhangra moves.

A widely shared video clip of the get-together had police personnel and authorised volunteers (who have been assisting police during lockdown) dancing to Punjabi pop music.

While people across the state are being told by cops to strictly follow social distancing rules, police officials inside Ludhaina’s Kotwali police station decided to break them without a care in the world during a “motivational get-together” held Monday.

A widely shared video clip of the get-together had police personnel and authorised volunteers (who have been assisting police during lockdown) dancing to Punjabi pop music. While some had their masks on, others had them hanging down from their faces as many hugged each other, clicked selfies while breaking into Bhangra moves.

Interestingly, the ‘get-together’ turned dance party had an elite guest list.

WATCH: Social distancing goes for a toss as policemen wearing masks dance at the ‘get-together’ organized at Division Number 1 (Kotwali) police station of #Ludhiana city. Party was held to ‘motivate’ cops @IndianExpress @iepunjab @DGPPunjabPolice @Ludhiana_Police #coronavirus pic.twitter.com/Gt60Yu228S

— Divya Goyal (@divya5521) May 4, 2020

Among those who attended it were Ludhiana Deputy Commissioner Pardeep Agarwal, city Police Commissioner Rakesh Agrawal, Additional DCP-1 Gurpreet Singh Sikand and ACP (Central) Waryam Singh. However, all these officials claimed that it was a ‘get-together’ which was organised to ‘motivate’ the force and it turned into a dance party after they had left the police station premises.

They, however, agreed that what happened was wrong and cops who turned it into a dance party, without following social distancing, were given a ‘strict warning’.

Officials claimed that it was a ‘get-together’ which was organised to ‘motivate’ the force and it turned into a dance party after they had left the police station premises.

Additional DCP-1, Gupreet Singh Sikand, who was one of the attendees and under whom division number-1 police station works, said: “We had organised a get-together as force and volunteers were on continuous duty since the lockdown had started. All that was allowed was food and some chit-chat, but what happened after senior officers left, should not have happened. We saw the viral videos and social distancing was completely defied. After officers left, someone started music and dancing. It should not have happened. Some NGO leaders arrived there and started this music and party. A warning has been issued against repeating any such thing in the future.”

ACP (Central) Waryam Singh also said that though he had attended the get-together, the dance started after he had left. “Some cops and volunteers must have started it. It should not have happened. Our motive was just to organise a small get-together to motivate the force. Whatever happened later was wrong. All that we had allowed was food and everything else was done without permission later,” said the ACP.

Inspector Rajwant Singh, SHO division number 1 police station, said that he had only organised the event for his staff and volunteers. “At the maximum, 60 people should have been there. I have no idea how at least a hundred more people reached police station and started music and dancing. We had invited DC and CP sir to participate and motivate the force. It happened after they left…”

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Contacted for comments, Rakesh Agrawal, Ludhiana police commissioner said that he had attended the “motivational get-together for a few minutes”. He, however, refused to comment further on the viral videos shot in police station premises.

Divya Goyal

Divya Goyal is a Principal Correspondent with The Indian Express, based in Punjab. Her interest lies in exploring both news and feature stories, with an effort to reflect human interest at the heart of each piece. She writes on gender issues, education, politics, Sikh diaspora, heritage, the Partition among other subjects. She has also extensively covered issues of minority communities in Pakistan and Afghanistan. She also explores the legacy of India's partition and distinct stories from both West and East Punjab. She is a gold medalist from the Indian Institute of Mass Communication (IIMC), Delhi, the most revered government institute for media studies in India, from where she pursued English Journalism (Print). Her research work on “Role of micro-blogging platform Twitter in content generation in newspapers” had won accolades at IIMC. She had started her career in print journalism with Hindustan Times before switching to The Indian Express in 2012. Her investigative report in 2019 on gender disparity while treating women drug addicts in Punjab won her the Laadli Media Award for Gender Sensitivity in 2020. She won another Laadli for her ground report on the struggle of two girls who ride a boat to reach their school in the border village of Punjab. ... Read More

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