BHOPAL: In a first of its kind initiative, a police station in Madhya Pradesh’s Betul district — which has been in existence for over a century and also witnessed the freedom struggle — has been converted into a museum.
Betul’s Ranipur police station was set up as a police outpost in 1895 and converted into a police station in 1913. Records as old as 1913 are available and have been put on display as exhibits. The first case registered here was in 1900 regarding a theft under IPC Section 380.
Freedom fighter Sardar Vishnu Singh Gond, a member of the All-India Forward Bloc that was set up by Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose and a resident of Mahendra Wadi village, had attacked this police station on August 22, 1942, with an axe. The marks of this axe attack are still available on the premises. Around 300 freedom fighters had also set the police station on fire.
Gond was later sentenced to life imprisonment by the then government. Now, the axe used by the freedom fighter along with his pictures feature among the exhibits in the museum.
Apart from this, around 100-year-old records of the police station, old weapons, pictures, and dress code of cops of all ranks — from director-general to constable — are put on display as exhibits. This old building was in use till 2016 when the police station was shifted to a new building.
SP Betul Shimala Prasad told TOI that the old building was lying abandoned after the police station was shifted. Initially, the building’s land was decided to be used as staff quarters, but then some locals protested saying it was a heritage monument that was testimony to the freedom struggle and should not be demolished.
“That was when we thought of converting the place into a museum. We had funds of around Rs 7 lakh for the renovation of an old building from police headquarters and the exhibits that are on display were already with us, so it was converted into a museum. It is open and free for everyone,” the SP said.
