ABSTRACT
As a result of rapid social change, Indian women in the 1990s made unprecedented demands for equal status with men and, in particular, for equal access to rewarding work and careers. As a result, new equal opportunity legislation was introduced by the government requiring that 33 percent of those recruited for government jobs, including the police, must be women. Male officers in Tamil Nadu responded to this new situation by threatening strike action unless the women recruited were assigned to the same work and conditions as male officers, widely perceived as being more onerous than in the AWPUs. This resulted in court rulings requiring that the cohort of women officers recruited in 1997 be assigned to regular police battalions, to undergo training alongside men, preparatory to assuming the full range of police duties. No longer could women recruits undergo training at the police training college for six months prior to being posted to general police units. Instead, like male officers, at the conclusion of their six months’ training they are now assigned to armed reserve/ battalions for six years, before being appointed to general police stations. In 1997, therefore, women police in Tamil Nadu fell into two distinct groups:
those recruited prior to 1997 who were deployed in AWPUs and in general police units
those recruited in 1997 who, as a result of the equal opportunity legislation, were placed in regular police battalions.
Unfortunately, the court rulings were issued only after the 1997 women recruits were enlisted and were still undergoing their six month’s training in the police college. Many of these women had been attracted to policing because of a very popular movie, “Vijayashanthi IPS”, which portrayed the heroine as a chivalrous yet tough cop. They identified with the heroine and wanted to protect their “sisters” from victimization. They imagined that after their initial period of six months’ training they would be assigned to the AWPUs where they could begin their work to help women victims. Instead, before their training was complete, they learned that they were to be assigned to the battalions, just like the male recruits.