If senior police officers are to be believed, efforts towards shifting this office to a different location are being made in right earnest. And, if that happens, Hanumandokha can be beautified in line with its world heritage site status and the police will be able to work better, says Superintendent of Police Kedar Rijal, the Metropolitan Police Range Kathmandu (MPRK) chief.[break]
"My office is not fit to remain here," he says.
Rijal sticks to his idea of shifting the MPRK office elsewhere, preferably to New Baneshwor or Babarmahal. Hanumandhoka is a place of historical importance, it is difficult to access, and this police infrastructure is old and decrepit, he further explains.
A recent assessment of the narrowly erected four-storey building which also accommodates Metropolitan Police Crime Division (MPCD), usually housing 700 including staffers, detainees and visitors at any given time during office hours, shows that the facility is only been left with some 15 percent of its lifespan. It can collapse anytime, even when there is an earthquake of low intensity, says the report.
"The study shows that we are in a sheer danger of getting crushed to death," said Rijal. "This is the predicament. We are rather the ones supposed to first respond to any such disaster in our jurisdiction."
Besides the fear of a looming collapse, the present atmosphere of ´Hanumandhoka Thana´ offers a very sorry picture. Its lock-up with a capacity of accommodating some 100 detainees generally packs in more than 300 at a time.
The detainees stay in the worst condition possible with stink filling up the whole building. A single room is available for the entire investigation and litigation procedures, with no space for interrogations. The lobby always happens to be like a jam-packed Asan alley.
MPRK officials say a single night in custody at Hanumandokha is enough for the detainees to seek out all measures to escape the ´hell´. "People often do not understand that we lag behind in service delivery because of our lowly set-up," said Rijal. "Rarely anywhere could a police office be as messed up as ours."
Nepal Police has started afresh efforts to seek an alternative to Hanumandhoka. The police headquarters have approached the line agencies including the Ministry of Home Affairs with two viable locations to relocate MPRK — the old Trolley Bus office building at Minbhawan and Post Office Training Centre at Babarmahal.
In a proposal prepared by Nepal Police, Post Office Training Centre is the best alternative due to its sprawling campus spread over 16 ropanis of land and specially because of its closeness to the District Administration Office, the District Court and the District Attorney Office.
"The idea to relocate the police office was floated 15 years ago but Hanumandhoka has only clogged up all these years," Rijal says. "This time around, we are hopeful to find a new place."
The efforts are being made to break free the real image of Hanumandhoka as a valued historical area away from the currently crammed and foul-smelling police office. If the intensive efforts by authorities to shift the office of MPRK to a different location indeed bring results, it is very likely that Hanumandhoka will not be loathed after that.
But, given the fluid political situation, no one can say when exactly the police office will be shifted out of the world heritage site Hanumandokha.
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