‘Hirkani”, A Well Equipped Recreation Centre for Pune’s Women Police

May 12, 2017

Hirkani’s story has inspired several folk stories and books and continues to inspire men and women in Maharashtra. Spreading her courageous spirit, the Pune City Police Headquarters recently inaugurated a multi-purpose building for its women constables and officers called ‘Hirkani’.

Hirkani is historically known as the poor milkmaid who made it out of Shivaji Maharaj’s high-walled Raigad Fort to reach her baby and feed her. It with this brave spirit that Raigad Fort has a wall named after her called ‘Hirkani Burj’.

Women have been a part of the police force for a long time in the state but such provisions for them have only just been made. This multi-purpose building has been in the works since the past three years. It was inaugurated on May 2.

“All of us give full credit to Commissioner of Police Rashmi Shukla Ma’am and Deputy Commissioner of Police Arvind Chavria. The facilities here are state-of-art and everything is maintained well,” says Rihana Sheikh, Ladies Police Nike (LPN) and the supervisor of the library, who has also served over a decade in the police force.

On the first floor is a library which has a wide variety of books on law, health, guides on giving exams like MPSC or UPSC and fictional novels. Off duty, many women come here to read up on the law or study for exams they’d like to give, explains Sheikh who was in-charge of selecting and buying the books for the library.

Bringing in high standard facilities, there is also a hostel within the building for women constables and officers to rest while not on duty. “Earlier there were a lot of problems with regards to the toilets for women. There were very few bathrooms and most of them were unclean. In my 11 years of service, this is the only thing I’ve had a problem with. But now it has been solved!” says Sheikh with a sigh of relief on her face. The bathroom in the complex contains several shower and toilet cubicles that are regularly maintained by caretakers and the women using it too.

The gymnasium that is in another building has been recently renovated has been equipped with the finest workout gear. Vikas Pokale, a police constable and a trainer in the gym speaks about the compulsory fitness of both men and women officers, “Before the renovation, barely any women used to come as most used to be hesitant to work out in a room crowded with men. Now, we have specific timings when the gym is open only to women and men aren’t allowed in then.”

A wide space has been created to form a crèche.

Just like Hirkani, the women too have to leave their children and go for their duties but want to make sure that they are fine. To ensure this, there is a crèche where police officers can leave their children in safe hands to be cared for while on duty. The Pune police force has finally recognised the needs of its women officers and this in turn will only inspire several other workforce organisations in the country to follow suit.