Ahmed Ali Fayyaz/Jammu

Soon after Republic Day, Bureaucrats India, An independent initiative to explore and celebrate stories of good governance, nominated 23 officers in 'Change-makers and ‘Innovators’ for their impressive performance at the grassroots level of the bureaucracy for 2023.

Charu Sinha, 54, IPS (1996) from Telangana, India’s first woman to be elevated as Inspector General of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and given charge of sectors figured at the top of the list of ‘Innovators-2023’.

Besides anti-terror operations, Charu launched a program of psychosocial support to end rising suicides among the force personnel and trained 28,000 of them during her two-year stint in Kashmir. 

When Charu took over as IG Srinagar Sector in 2021, 58 CRPF personnel had committed suicide. This was her major in-house challenge for her.

While supervising counterterror and intelligence gathering operations in the most Naralism and terrorism-affected areas of India, Charu Sinha initiated ‘Love You Zindagi’ (LYZ), a stress relieving programme while heading the force in Bihar and later Kashmir and Telangana. 

Designed by Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Coimbatore, ‘LYZ’ earned her the FICCI Smart Policing Award in 2022.

Charu Sinha

Bureaucrats India is an independent initiative exploring and celebrating the stories of good governance launched by former bureaucrats across the country.

Charu is currently posted as Inspector General of Police (IGP), CRPF, Southern Sector, at Hyderabad. She has also served in the UN peacekeeping force in Kosovo.

As Assistant Superintendent of Police in Pulivendula, (Cuddapah) and Eluru (WG district), she handled factional feuds, communalism, and other crimes. As Officer on Special Duty, she was in charge of anti-extremist operations in Medak district whilst heading 5 districts as Superintendent of Police. In Mahbubnagar and Prakasam districts, her performance as a counter-extremist officer was widely hailed.

Charu worked on educating Chenchu tribals against the ills of supporting extremists. Her efforts resulted in erasing extremism in Mahbubnagar district. In other districts like Chittoor, East Godavari, and Nizamabad, she handled communal violence, factional feuds, heinous crimes, and social issues impacting women, children, and the elderly. 

In Jammu and Srinagar, Charu planned and led counterterror operations. She led, monitored, and supervised the conduct of several anti-terrorist operations through the Valley Quick Action Team (QAT).

 During her tenure joint operations of the security forces ended with death and arrests of several top-ranking terrorists.

Charu Sinha’s initiatives led to better working conditions for the CRPF e personnel and also improved their productivity. The programme took care of their physical, mental, and emotional health.

Charu was awarded the Indian Police Medal in 2012, Police Medal for Meritorious Service in 2016 besides several DGs Commendation Discs and President’s Police Medal for Distinguished Service in 2023.

The premise of her initiative was that Policemen and women face challenging conditions both at home and in the workplace. Under stree, they undergo serious behavioural changes especially while serving in conflict areas. Unable to handle it some of them fall into depression and take extreme steps to end life.

Charu had launched a campaign to create awareness about gender discrimination in the force during her posting in Bihar. In Kashmir her intiative ‘LYZ' was operated with a grid of 50 master trainers and 550 frontline trainers who trained 28,000 personnel.

In the week-long course, each group of jawans was taught and explained how to identify and sort out the issues arising out of all kinds of pressures. The tagline of the course is – Happy jawan, Happy family, Happy force.

The ‘LYZ’ trainers told Awaz-The Voice that there were hundreds of success stories of transformation.

“After attending this programme, thousands of our boys bought scooties for their wives and shared with them their burden of patriarchy. Previously, they took the entire burden at home, from the construction of a house to admission and supervision of their children at the school on their shoulders. They seldom made their spouses partner in such responsibility to retain patriarchy. Even on leave, they used to run errands. Their holiday was rarely a holiday. LYZ brought relief to thousands of such depressed families", said an officer while explaining how interpersonal dynamics changed at their homes.

The trainers in LYZ course primarily focused on cognitive distortion, financial management, communication skills, and gender conversation.

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One of the trainers narrated how LYZ brought happiness to the chronically depressed homes of the jawans. “Previously many of them used to argue and quarrel with their spouses and children. After the training, they shared partnerships and empowered their spouses while giving them scooties and UPI smart cards. We witnessed a case in which the father of a jawan, posted in Srinagar, suffered a heart attack at 2:00 am in his home State. His wife and mother rushed him to the hospital on the scootie and saved his life in the dead of night. It made all family members relieved and happy”, he said.