VB Nagar police station: Sprayed with drain water, infested with mosquitoes

The police station is actually located on the ground floor of a three-storey residential society, adjacent to a clogged nullah.

The police station is located on the ground floor of a three-storey residential society adjacent to a clogged nullah.

To get to Vinoba Bhave Nagar police station, visitors must take a barely motorable lane with shops on either side from the BEST bus stand outside Kurla Railway Station (West) through a lane so narrow that two vehicles cannot pass each other. So, every afternoon, when women hurry through the lane with schoolchildren in tow, it’s a chaotic situation all along the road. And it’s not uncommon to see a police patrolling vehicle stuck in the middle, unable to reverse or move ahead.

Tucked away in the farthest corner of its own jurisdiction, the police station is barely visible until one is within a few metres of it. Only the beacon-bearing police vehicles parked outside indicate its presence. Oddly, the police station is actually located on the ground floor of a three-storey residential society, adjacent to a clogged nullah.

This makeshift arrangement used to be a police chowky under the Kurla police station until nine years ago. In 2006, the police department decided that the Kurla area was too large for a single police station, and sanctioned a new police station. The issue, however, was the one encountered with every new police station — finding land.

Finally, the VB Nagar chowky of the Kurla police was converted into the VB Nagar police station. Two extra rooms were added to the existing structure and the police station was inaugurated in 2006.

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“The biggest problem that we encounter on a daily basis is the nullah right next to the police station, which attracts mosquitoes. Every evening, they swarm into the station house,” says Senior Police Inspector Subhash Raut, VB Nagar police station. The nullah also emits a foul stench. In the rainy season, water from the nullah overflows on the road outside, often entering the station house.

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“Every time a vehicle passes by, it sends a spray of dirty water into the police station. Many of us fall sick due to the dirty water and the mosquitoes,” says Raut.

As the police station is located on MHADA land, any funding for maintenance or repairs has to come from MHADA, a lengthy process to say the least. The police cannot construct additional structures either.

“Recently, we built two exterior structures, one a changing room for female personnel and the other a separate room for the Anti Terror Cell, which we want to keep separate. We have told the MHADA that these are temporary and we will remove them whenever they need to use the land,” Raut says.

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The three-kilometre jurisdiction of the police station is a communally sensitive one, with several different communities staying close to each other. For this reason, the number one priority for the police station is maintaining peace in case of any incident with communal overtones reported anywhere in the city.

But as the VB Nagar police also does not have a lock up of its own, all of its accused have to be taken to Kurla police station, leading to long delays every time an accused is to be presented in court or brought to the police station for interrogation.

gautam.mengle@expressindia.com

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