Retired Odisha professor seeks to donate house for construction of police station

In a letter to CM's private secretary, he offered to donate his three-room newly constructed house in Balitutha village of coastal Jagatsinghpur district to Odisha police.

Updated on: Jan 18, 2021, 21:24:41 IST

By Debabrata Mohanty, Bhubaneswar

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A 70-year-old retired professor of English in Odisha has offered to donate his 3-roomed pucca house in his native village to Odisha police for the construction of a police station.

The Odisha Police Officers’ Association made the demand after an inspector in Balasore district was assaulted on Saturday by irate public over the suicide of a minor boy in a roadside dhaba. (Representative image/PTI)

Rabindra Nath Mishra retired as a Reader in English from Ravenshaw University of Cuttack a decade ago. In a letter to chief minister's private secretary, VK Pandian, last month, he offered to donate his three-room newly constructed house in Balitutha village of coastal Jagatsinghpur district to Odisha police so that a police station can be constructed.

"We don't have a police station in the radius of 12 kilometres on one side (Kujang PS) and on the other side (Ersama PS) at a distance of 14 kilometres. Balitutha is well connected to Cuttack-Paradeep Highway by a black-topped road. Though there are two nationalised banks, a private bank, a telephone exchange, a primary health centre, a high school, an ME School and a primary school at this place, there is no police station nearby. This place is a gateway to Posco/Jindal site. I, along with a number of people of my area met the DGP, Odisha in November 2013 who promised to do the needful, but nothing has borne fruit so far," Mishra wrote in his letter.

Though as per norms, there has to be at least one police station in each block, Odisha currently has 627 police stations, double the number of its blocks. Jagatsinghpur district has 14 regular police stations including 11 territorial police stations. With the Ministry of Home Affairs offering financial assistance for the modernisation of police infrastructure, the number of police stations have gone up in the state. On December 30, chief minister Naveen Patnaik inaugurated 6 new police stations.

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Mishra said he wanted to donate the house which he had constructed four years ago as he does not need for it. "I and my wife, a retired professor of Ramadevi University are settled in Cuttack town. My son is pursuing his Ph D in mechanical engineering in the US while two daughters are busy in their studies and career. As no one is staying in that house which I constructed after spending ₹10.5 lakh, I don't want it to go waste. No one in my family need any money from that house. I want to donate the house for a police station so that law and order situation can be better managed in 11 gram panchayats of my area," he said.

Mishra said the current value of the house would be over ₹20 lakh.

Jagatsinghpur SP R Prakash said opening a police station depends on its feasibility as well as crime profile of the area. "We have to do crime analysis of the area over the last 3 years. Besides, in this case, the nearest police stations are not very far. But we can think of opening an outpost or beat house in the village for patrolling purposes if my superiors permit it. If we get the permission for opening a beat house or an outpost, re-distribution of staff can be done," said the SP.

Last year, a lawyer in Jagatsinghpur had made the district collector the nominee of ₹14 lakh fixed deposit that he kept in two bank accounts. Civil lawyer Basudeb of Jagatsinghpur district in July last year made the district collector of Jagatsinghpur as the nominee in two fixed deposits held by him and his wife. While one deposit was worth ₹2 lakh, another contained ₹12 lakh. The lawyer wanted the money to be used for the underprivileged and the downtrodden people of the district.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Debabrata Mohanty
Debabrata Mohanty is a senior assistant editor of Hindustan Times who works as state correspondent from Odisha covering the state's politics, governance, public policy, natural disasters, environment and its society for close to three decades. With his long years of reporting from the state capital of Bhubaneswar, Mohanty has been known as one of the most experienced and credible journalists covering Odisha for the national English dailies. His reporting combines on-ground detail with deep institutional knowledge detailing the state's changing politics, governance issues, administrative reforms and the functioning of its public institutions. He has regularly reported on issues ranging from legislative developments and public policy implementation. Politics is his core areas of expertise as he closely tracks Odisha's political landscape, including the rise and transformation of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Biju Janata Dal (BJD), the two principal political parties in Odisha. His long association with the state's political establishment enables him to write on contemporary developments in a larger political context. Mohanty takes a deep interest in writing human interest stories, environmental issues and documenting the impact of cyclones, floods, heatwaves, and other climate-related events in one of the most disaster-prone states. His coverage extends to public health, governance reforms and stories on accountability of government institutions. Before joining Hindustan Times, Mohanty worked with The Indian Express, Mail Today, and The Telegraph, where he covered at least six general elections and as many assembly elections. In 2007, he was selected for the prestigious Chevening Young Indian Print Journalist Programme at the University of Lincoln, United Kingdom, where he received advanced training in print journalism. In 2009 he won the Press Institute of India-International Committee of Red Cross award on conflict reporting for his on-ground reportage of 2008 Kandhamal riots.Read More

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