Bhopal: Months after Assam government announced a slew of measures to improve the fitness of police personnel in the state, including regular and mandatory physical training, Madhya Pradesh also initiated steps to ensure cops stay in the best of their health to meet requirements of their jobs.
Cops in the state seem to be on a new mission now — a daily regimen of hard physical exercises to cut the extra flab to ensure they are physically and mentally fit. As part of this step, mini gyms and 'sleeping rooms' will be opened in 100 police stations. Sources said the fittest person from the police station will be made the coach. Rest rooms will ensure that cops can take a short nap if they feel tired.
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For this, a proposal has been prepared by the home department for execution. The authorities are worried about the incidents of increasing stress among the policemen in the police stations. Several rounds of talks were held on how to keep the policemen fit and stress free. For this, data was collected from the police stations in the state.
The survey revealed a good number of police men are unfit and are suffering from many diseases. The initiative will begin first in those police stations which are far from urban areas and policemen stay away from their homes for several months. These police stations will be redeveloped.
Officers said many new constables showed interest to go for workout. Commenting on the initiative, home minister Narottam Mishra said there are gyms in police stations in urban areas. Now there is a need to start in remote police stations. A project was started nine years ago and the project remained limited to the city so far. The government had decided about nine years ago to open one gym between every 10 police stations in the state.
Even a decision was taken to arrange pure food at the police stations. This plan was prepared by the then home minister late Babulal Gaur. Gaur believed that most of the policemen of the state were suffering from various diseases. According to him, the police personnel do 12 to 14 hours duty every day. Therefore, they need regular exercise to keep fit.
