‘Don’t consume any type of drugs; otherwise you will lose your family.’ These are the exact words written on a postcard by a student of 6th standard, addressed to the Superintendent of Police of Motihari district in Bihar. And this is not the only one. There are scores of such postcards, all written by school children to police officers.
The children are actually taking part in an initiative of Motihari SP, Dr. Kumar Ashish, whereby he motivates children studying in classes below 10 to write slogans against drugs and alcoholism addiction and send these to him and other police officers. The positive impact of this initiative is clearly visible as more than five hundred children have written to the police till now. The police department will honour the top 10 beautifully written post cards and give a certificate of appreciation to the writers.
Indian Masterminds interacted with 2012-batch IPS officer and SP of Motihari district, Dr. Kumar Ashish, to know more about this initiative.
WRITING A POSTARD
Hundreds of post cards reach the SP office and all have one thing in common – a slogan against drugs and alcohol and a promise to stay away from any intoxicant. Speaking with Indian Masterminds, Mr. Ashish said, “The words of children have a great effect on the entire family. If a child is aware of something, he talks about it to everyone in his entire house. In this way our message reaches as many people as possible. It spreads from the child to his family members, then to society, from society to the village, and from the village to the block and cities. In this way, awareness about Bihar government’s liquor ban and drug de-addiction campaign starts spreading from the school itself.”
Another reason was to give postcards, inland letter cards, etc., which are now a thing of the past, a fresh lease of life by bringing these to the attention of the children and encouraging them to write letters, the officer added.
HOW IT’S DONE
A police team goes to the schools and tells the children about this initiative. The children are also made aware about the drug de-addiction campaign and the ill effects of drugs on society. Then they are asked to write a message on this issue. The children write their messages on postcards and send them to the police office. The 10 most beautiful postcards are selected and the writers get a reward and a citation. So far, more than 500 postcards have been written by children from many schools of Raxaul and sent to police offices.
“Right now our entire focus is on Raxaul sub-division, because this is a border area adjoining Nepal. In the last 1 month itself, we have recovered more than 12 kg of super charas. That is why, this campaign has been started here with a lot of thought, to improve things from the grassroots level. It has been started from the level of children so that our message reaches the entire household. The police is continuously taking action against drugs, but without public participation, this campaign will not be successful.”
MOTIHARI POLICE RAID
Following the policy of zero tolerance against intoxicants, a total of 5698 raids were conducted by the Motihari Police under the leadership of Superintendent of Police Dr. Kumar Ashish. In these raids, latest technology drones are used by the police in remote and inaccessible areas.A total of 13,907 litres of liquor were seized in the month of September, out of which 5,802 litres were foreign and 2,054 litres were country liquor. In the month of September, a total of 405 people were arrested in cases related to alcohol, in which, 99 were first-time drinkers, 8 more than once and 298 were booked for related offences.
