Morning walkers at a children’s park at SK Puri in Patna on Monday morning. Picture by Deepak Kumar

Patna, April 18: The desire to go for a healthy morning walk is increasingly proving unhealthy for residents of the state capital. Reason: morning walkers are becoming easy prey for criminals and troublemakers.

With two back-to-back incidents — one of eve-teasing and the other of loot — in Patna in the past 24 hours, regular morning walkers are having second thoughts about venturing out early in the morning.

On Sunday, two people were nabbed and handed over to the police by fellow morning walkers after they abused and teased a middle-aged lady, who was taking a stroll in the Patna Zoo.

Patna senior superintendent of police (SSP) Alok Kumar said the two men were harassing the lady for quite some time.

On Sunday, when the lady protested, a few fellow morning walkers caught the men and handed them over to the Sachivalaya police station.

Sunday also saw some residents of the area catching some men who used to move around in autorickshaws, targeting people travelling in the small hours.

Kumar said the men are being interrogated. “It is possible that these men targeted morning walkers apart from those coming from the Patna Junction,” he said.

Police sources said they were always present at various places to protect morning walkers, but the people disagreed. “I have rarely seen a police patrol vehicle in areas where we walk in the morning. I have been going to the Patna zoo for the past two months and have never seen any policemen in the place. A large number of people come to the zoo for morning walks, including women. There should be more security arrangements, especially with the increase in criminal activities here,” said R.K. Pradhan, a state government employee.

The most popular spots for morning walkers include Patna Zoo at Bailey Road and the Eco Park near the old Secretariat. A few prefer to walk in the parks nearest to their apartements.

Nimisha Kumar, a doctor, said incidents of eve-teasing were common. “There are some men who stand outside the zoo gate and stare at girls and women. Sometimes they pass lewd comments and laugh among themselves. It is always better to ignore them. I have seen police on some occasions but then they just pass through the area without stopping. Something should be done about this,” she said.

Several people said the Eco Park was relatively safer than the Patna Zoo.

“The location of the (Eco) park is in the VIP area and hence there is police presence. But what about the small parks and roads? I have not seen the police moving near the SK Puri park, which is visited by a number of morning walkers everyday. Continuous police patrol is necessary at these places in the morning hours,” said Jyoti Sharma, a housewife.

The police, however, maintained patrolling was done all the time. “The gangs see it differently. They know that police movement will not be very active between 5am and 7am. With less police presence, the joggers become easy targets,” a police officer said.

SSP Kumar said the police are doing their job. “They (the police) have been given clear instructions to move around and continue patrolling in the areas,” he said.