Mumbai: Why Wadala GRP police are living in a nightmare every day

The police station walls have cracked due to the constant vibrations caused by passing trains

Walls that shudder with every passing train, and the noise that they make, along with their deafening horns, is what office means for the staff of the Government Railway Police station at Wadala. Located between platform two and three at the station, the policemen have been living in a nightmare for several years now. The station is infamously known to be worse than punishment postings among GRP personnel, as a train almost shakes them up every three minutes.

Established in 2000, the Wadala GRP keeps a check on anti-social elements and commuter safety across 13 stations on the Harbour line. "It is very irritating when we literally shake in our seats every few minutes. If it's a fast train, the vibrations are worse. The sound is so deafening that we have to use earplugs inside the police station," complained Rajendra Pal, senior inspector of Wadala GRP.

A large crack runs along one wall of the GRP station at Wadala. Pics/Pradeep Dhivar and Suraj Ojha

"We have written to the authorities several times but no concrete steps to move us out of this hell have been taken. Earlier, there was some space in front of our police station where we had planted a few trees for relief but with the platform extension, that space has been taken over too," he added.

The staff posted here said that they would initially suffer from severe headaches with the strong vibrations and noise of the passing trains. "There were also several cracks on the walls of the police station due to this. Water bottles, wall clocks, and photographs on the wall, along with papers on the desk, fall on to the floor every time a train passes," added a constable at the police station. "Around 2016-17, a part of a wall had fallen too and a constable had a narrow escape. The repair work was done after this incident," he said.

GRP staff also face acute water shortage issues at the only common toilet inside the station.

Not just the noise
The cracking walls have also led to leakages from the roof, adding to the woes of the policemen posted here. "Last year, some water dripped onto our computers and they had to be scrapped," said an officer, adding, "We fear for our documents every monsoon. When it rains very heavy, there is also water logging inside the police station. Every time we lose our documents, we contact the headquarters and they give us print-outs from their library."

The last time officers of Wadala GRP wrote to senior railway authorities was on December 20 last year. An officer posted here for over five years said that the Mumbai Railway Vikas Corporation (MRVC) had planned to convert this police station into a public toilet. "They are to build a new three-storey police station on platform one and shift both the RPF and GRP into it. They started work on this in 2016 with the construction of six pillars but work has stopped ever since," he informed.

Rajendra Pal, senior inspector, Wadala GRP

No place for women
The police station hardly has any space for seating or a changing room for the 32 female constables posted here. "We request the male staff to go out of the room for a while whenever we have to change. We also often use the common toilets," a female constable said. There are just two toilets at the Wadala GRP police station - one inside the cabin of the senior inspector and a common one used by all the 180 male and female staff posted here. "We get water for an hour a day. Sometimes this water doesn't last through the day and we have to lock our toilets in such cases. The male staff sometimes urinates in the open but the females have to go to the RPF police station or the one on platform number one at the King's Circle end," another officer added.

An MRVC official said that the organisation was looking after the construction of a new building initially, but the "the responsibility to build a police station has been given to the Central railways now."

"Making an estimate for a ground-plus-two building at Wadala station is under process on the MRVC fund. Provision for a GRP office has been made in the new building," said Anil Kumar Jain, senior PRO of Central Railway, without explaining the delay in construction work.

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