nutritionist Rujuta Divekar

KEM hospital

Isha Foundation

Mumbai police

Naigaon Police Training Centre

fitness programme

Lunch time at the boot camp on Saturday

A Yoga session

The camp is being supervised by, doctors fromand police’s in-house trainers.Thehas launched its most ambitious programme yet to whip the force into shape. On Friday, the first batch of 150 men, all in dire need to shed some kilos, joined a month-long boot camp at thein Dadar.This camp isn’t like any otherthat Mumbai police has seen in the past. These 150 men have been given a month off from work to attend the camp, which is being supervised by nutritionist Rujuta Divekar, a panel of doctors from KEM hospital, Yoga experts from Isha foundation, and in-house fitness experts.The 150 men will spend 12 hours a day, six days a week at the camp, reporting in at 7 am and leaving at 7 pm. Divekar has designed a sevenmeals-a-day diet chart for them, with their day starting at home with a banana or dry dates and ending, again at home, with a glass of milk with turmeric powder, ginger powder and sugar/jaggery.Through the day, the group will be put through their paces by gym instructors and Yoga exponents under the guidance of KEM hospital doctors. There will be motivational speakers too, just in case somebody’s spirit flags.The exercise regimen will comprise of warm up and stretching, walks or slow run, aerobics, balancing and strength building exercises and yoga and meditation.Five meals at the camp will comprise breakfast, lunch, two snacks/health drinks, and dinner (see chart).The boot camp is a part of Mumbai Police Commissioner Subodh Kumar Jaiswal’s ‘Svastha Police Sashakta Police’ campaign. Those enlisted for the camp are cops whose Body Mass Index (BMI) was touching ‘dangerous’ mark, said a police officer who did not wish to identified. As per Mumbai police’s internal survey, around 8 per cent of the 40,000-strong force is overweight.Joint Commissioner of police, Law and Order, Deven Bharti said the hectic work schedule leaves policemen with no time to take care of themselves. “This is an effort to push them towards a healthy lifestyle,” he said.To ensure that they don’t fall back into bad eating habits, the wives of the 150 policemen had a session with Divekar on Thursday, where they were explained the benefits of a healthy diet and were also given cooking tips.“We will also have doctors from Tata Memorial, Prof D S Natarajan from Aditya Jyot Eye Hospital and Dr Sayed Abrar for dental health care consulting at the boot camp,” said S Jayakumar, Additional Commissioner of Police, Local Arms.Deputy Commissioner of Police, Local Arms, Niyati Thaker said learnings from the first camp will help them refine the whole programme further.One of the boot camp participants, who did not wish to be identified, said he was pleasantly surprised to know that somebody in the force was concerned about his health.