For over three months, the book-lugging girl with the quick smile was a fixture at the MGM Medical College canteen in Indore. Cheerful and sprightly, she easily made friends — from the canteen boys to the students hanging around over chai and chit-chat. No one took her for anything else but a young medical student or a nurse.
No one had a clue the friendly fresher was a keen-eyed policewoman cutting her teeth in her first major mission.
The undercover cop, 24-year-old Shalini Chouhan, gathered enough information to crack a blind case that had thwarted investigators for over five months. She helped identify 11 seniors who were accused of the brutal ragging of a group of first-year MBBS students in July this year.
Shalini, posted at Sanyogitaganj police station in Indore, was recently inducted into the force and Mission MGM was her first operation. Her father, a policeman, died in 2010 and her mother died a year later. Inspired by her father, she joined the force.