RPF’s Shakti teams for women safety launched

HYDERABAD: The Railway Protection Force (RPF) of the Secunderabad division said it had launched ‘Rudrama’ and ‘Nagamma’, two all-woman Shakti teams, who will carry weapons, for the safety of women and children travelling in trains.

The teams are named after Rani Rudrama Devi of the Kakatiya dynasty and Nayakuralu Nagamma of Karimnagar, who became Prime Minister of the Palnadu kingdom in Andhra Pradesh. She is known as the world’s first Prime Minister.

Debashmita C. Banerjee, senior divisional security commissioner, Secunderabad, said the armed teams would operate round the clock in two sections in the division. She said also in the works were a WhatsApp group for regular women passengers. She was speaking on the RPF Raising Day on Tuesday.

Banerjee, a 2012 batch IRPS officer who took charge recently, said each Shakti team would be led by a woman sub-inspector and have seven members.

Team Rudrama would in Secunderabad and its surrounding routes and Team Nagamma on the Secunderabad-Kazipet-Ramagundam route. “Gradually we will deploy these teams on all routes,” she added. They would with already existing grievance mechanisms.

She said the RPF was coming up with artificial intelligence and machine learning based software and building a database of known offenders to prevent crime.

Strict vigil

The Secunderabad RPF said it had booked a host of cases till this year, till August

57 persons arrested in 80 luggage theft cases 

225 boys and 78 girls wandering in railway premises rescued

7 children rescued, 2 traffickers arrested.

Cash, valuables worth Rs 1.35 crore which passengers forgot in trains, traced and returned to owners. 

521 kgs of ganja seized

102 cases booked against touts selling tickets illegally