Maitree Vihar police to control Salia Sahi

Bhubaneswar: Maitree Vihar police station, one of the 36 police stations, approved by chief minister Naveen Patnaik, will control crime in Odisha’s biggest slum Salia Sahi.
At present, Salia Sahi, with a population of around 1.5 lakh, comes under the jurisdiction of the Nayapalli police station. Maitree Vihar comes under the Chandrasekharpur police limit.The commissionerate police has decided to carve out the entire Salia Sahi slum from the Nayapalli police map and include it under the new Maitree Vihar police area.
“Bulk of the cases, registered at Nayapalli police station, are reported from Salia Sahi. The inclusion of Salia Sahi under the Maitree Vihar police station will ease the pressure from Nayapalli police station,” commissioner of police Soumendra Priyadarshi said.
A major reason for carving out Salia Sahi slum from Nayapalli police station limits is to ensure that the Nayapalli police provide better security to Kalinga Stadium, which has been hosting several national and international sporting events in regular intervals.
“Kalinga Stadium is a major landmark under Nayapalli police station. During major sporting events at Kalinga Stadium, the Nayapalli police was busy with dealing with cases at the slum. Since the slum will come under the Maitree Vihar police’s jurisdiction, officials of Nayapalli police can now give more focus to Kalinga Stadium,” another police official said.
It must be noted that Odisha will host the Hockey Men’s World Cup at Kalinga Stadium in January next year and India’s matches of the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup in October. Salia Sahi has been a headache for the police as theft, robbery, burglary, drug peddling, illicit liquor trading and several other crimes have been occurring unabated. “A major reason behind proliferation of crime in Salia Sahi is lack of regulation on tenants, who migrate here from other districts. Offenders use the slum as hide-outs,” said a Salia Sahi local.
Though police claimed they are trying to control crimes in Salia Sahi, they expressed their limitations in conducting regular police patrolling due to congestion and bad roads in the slum.
“With the help of volunteers, we are trying to prevent crimes in the slums,” a police official said.