Dancing policeman quitting

Press, 26 December 1985, Page 6

Dancing policeman quitting

NZPA-AP New Delhi New Delhi’s dancing traffic policeman, the pirouetting patrolman near Parliament, will give his final performance next week after 13 years of pleasing motorists with his fancy footwork and his refusal to issue a ticket.

“I made every motorist who passed me smile, and brought some joy and order in traffic chaos,’’ says Head Constable Inder Singh Tanwar, the 43-year-old celebrity at the nation’s most regal intersection.

He will perform his last tango in traffic on New Year’s Eve. Every day for years, Constable Tanwar guided traffic through the boulevards with whizzing arm signals and fancy steps that critics complain confuses drivers rather than helps them. Constable Tanwar, India’s only known dancing “cop”, says that he hopes to go to the United States and teach school children how to prevent mayhem with a smile and soft shoe shuffle. The United States Embassy says

that it has never heard of him. “I feel thrilled whenever people smile and wave/’ Constable Tanwar says. “Motorists park and watch, and I am proud I never had to give any tickets or get angry.” He has become a landmark where he performs his daily minuet for motorists at Raj Path — the Kings Road — opposite the former British viceroy’s Palace, now Government offices, facing India Gate, and Parliament.