Revenue police to be history in Uttarakhand soon

Introduced more than 150 years ago by the Britishers to police the hilly areas of Uttarakhand, the 'Patwari' or revenue police system - where revenue officials play the role of policemen - is finally set to become history.

The state government earlier this week decided to bring all the revenue police under the ambit of regular police in a phased manner.

Revenue police operates in about 60% geographical part of the hill state.


While it was a long-pending demand to replace the revenue police with regular police, the government swung into action only after the recent murder of a 19-year-old receptionist, Ankita Bhandari, at a resort near Rishikesh, which triggered an outrage.

It was the revenue police that had initially registered the missing case of Bhandari before the case was later transferred to regular police for proper investigation.

The allegation against the revenue police was that it could not handle the case in a professional manner.

The state government has now decided to set up six new police stations and 20 new police outposts in the areas currently controlled by the revenue police. The police stations will be set up at Yamkeshwar (Pauri), Chham (Tehri), Ghat (Chamoli), Khansyu (Nainital), Deghat and Dhaulchhina (Almora).

In the first phase, the government will set up police stations and police outposts in such areas where economic and tourism activities registered growth.

Although Uttarakhand came into existence as a separate state two decades ago, there were no serious attempts on part of the successive governments to end the Patwari police operating mainly in the hilly areas of the state. In all such areas, it is the revenue police that register cases and investigate them. Around 7,500 villages in the state are under the revenue police currently.

Britishers started the system in 1861 when they had found it difficult to set up police stations and police outposts in hilly areas and handed over the task of policing in such areas to the revenue department.

'Patwaries' are supposed to handle the land record works mainly.

"Apart from maintaining the land record, they also handle the works relating to policing," said a source in Uttarakhand police who requested not to be named. "Now, the government is setting up new police stations. Thus, the police work would be exclusively done at the police stations and police outposts."

While Uttarakhand continues to witness growth in the number of hotels, resorts and adventure sports centres in its hilly areas, the state needs to improve policing in all such areas. The state attracts tourists and pilgrims from all parts of the country.