May 15 will mark a historic milestone in the achievements of the Kerala police, as the first police battalion entirely comprising tribal candidates will officially join the force.
On Wednesday at 7 am, the 74 candidates participated in a graduation parade at Thrissur Police Academy in the presence of the State Chief of Police Loknath Behera. The parade officially marks the end of nine months of rigorous training the candidates received at the police academy in Thrissur.
“Swimming, yoga, karate, commando training, high altitude and night firing training (to fire during encounters in the night) were part of the specially designed curriculum of the tribal candidates,” an official source at the Kerala police headquarters told TNM.
The new batch was chosen from tribal communities in Palakkad, Malappuram and Wayanad.
“We have eight candidates from Malappuram, 15 from Palakkad and 51 from Wayanad. Two of the candidates are post graduates, two of them are Bachelor of Education (B.Ed) graduates, seven other graduates, 30 candidates who have passed Class 12 and 31 who completed SSLC,” the source added.
Twenty-four of the candidates are women, and among them is Chandrika, the sister of Madhu, the tribal youth from Attapadi who was lynched to death in February 2018.
“I attended the interview right after my brother was lynched. It was a difficult time for me and the officers understood this,” she recalls. Aside from Chandrika, state football team member M Aswathy and National Judo Championship participant C Easwari are also part of the battalion that passed out on Wednesday.
Speaking to TNM, Anup Kuruvila IPS, who was in charge of battalion’s training, explained that the curriculum was crafted especially for the battalion for their training and approved by the government.
“It was a different process of recruitment and hence we wanted to make the candidates as comfortable as possible. We introduced all the ingredients, like training and skill development with lots of orientation so that the candidates were comfortable,” Anup said.
Upon leaving the academy, the officers will be stationed at forest regions in their home towns.
“They are familiar with the region and hence will be stationed there. Since they are trained in combat and night firing, they are also competent to participate in anti-insurgency operations to combat naxal attacks,” the source added.