Mounted police back in action

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Decked up in khaki with pith helmets, the mounted police take charge on their horses as the city sleeps. Night patrolling by the mounted police, which had been stopped for a while, has been resumed recently.It was in 2002 that the city police first decided to carry out night patrol using the service of mounted police. Initially, the patrolling was carried out at General hospital area, Jawahar Nagar and East Fort with two horses each.With the death of Venus, the lone mare in the wing, in 2013, the neglected state of the mounted police unit came to the fore. The deteriorating health of the horses forced officials to cut short patrolling to two areas. Gradually, the practice was discontinued."With just seven horses in the unit we were way below the sanctioned strength of 35. It was becoming increasingly difficult to send the horses on a rotational basis as two of the seven were physically unfit. Hence we had no option but to stop the patrol at the General Hospital", said an official with the unit.Last April, seven new horses were bought from the Pune Royal Turf Club in bid to revive the mounted police unit. "The horses were trained for the next six months during which period the night patrols had to be temporarily stopped. But since November, 2013, we have been patrolling East Fort and Jawahar Nagar areas daily for three hours from midnight" the officer added.As a measure to reduce the burden on the stallions in the force, the practice of lending out horses for temple festivals has been stopped, but the animals are still used for parades, shooting and aarattu. "A proposal to buy the next set of horses has been approved and it is expected to join the unit in three months", said city police commissioner P Vijayan. With the arrival of new horses in the unit, they hope to extend the night patrols to other part of the city.