In this pancha area, police fear to tread

dehra dun: the police cannot enter the area of pushpa rana, gram pradhan attak farm gram panchayat, near here, without her permission. sometime ago, she took a step that will go a long way in rekindling the people's faith in panchayats. in her area, people used to approach the police on the slightest pretext. this led to increased police interference into the matters of her panchayat to the extent that they began taking advantage of the situation.rana took her ward members into confidence. ''i convinced them that if they wanted to increase people's confidence in the panchayats, we must settle our disputes among ourselves instead of banking on an outside force, like the police,'' she said. notices were put up at all public places urging the people to approach the panchayat first for getting their disputes settled instead of running to the police. ''and for some reason, if they wanted to approach the police, we told them that they must take the panchayat's permission,'' said rana. ''we also told the people that if anyone disobeyed this, his family would be socially boycotted,'' she said commenting that the idea was to create some scare among the people — ''for a good cause sometimes it is necessary.'' she talked about this at a gram sabha meeting also. she told the members that the panahchat should first try and solve any matter and if it was beyond their powers, then the matter should be referred to the police. she met the local police station in charge and asked for his cooperation in this regard. at first, the police officer made fun of the concept and asked sarcastically: ''you don't want us to come even if there is a murder?'' she told him: ''we would cross the bridge when it comes.'' reluctantly, the police agreed to the panchayat's decision. at first, the people did not take the panchayat's initiative seriously, but they started doing so gradually when they realised that whenever they approached the police, the latter themselves advised them to first get in touch with rana. when she was able to solve one case with the help of her ward members, the people began approaching her and the panchayat. ''i succeeded in gaining the people's trust and saved them from unwarranted police exploitation,'' said rana.