Five Beats, Five Constables: The Night Plan
You are preparing the night domination plan for five beats: Bus Stand (B), Hospital (H), Market (M), Highway (N), and School (S). Five constables are available: Rana, Verma, Singh, Kaur and Bhat. The SHO gives these conditions: (i) Kaur, the only woman on the team, must be at Market because of the women's help desk; (ii) Rana must be at Bus Stand because he knows the vendors; (iii) Verma must be at Hospital or Highway; (iv) Singh and Kaur cannot be on adjacent beats - Market is adjacent to Bus Stand, and Hospital is adjacent to School; (v) Bhat has not passed the wireless test, so he cannot take Highway; (vi) Singh's driving licence is suspended, so he cannot take Highway; and (vii) Bhat is the only one who has the school caretaker's number, so he must be at School. Assign one constable to each beat. Later, Kaur reports sick and no other woman is available in the station.
1. Complete the assignment and show how each condition eliminates alternatives.
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Start with the fixed conditions: Kaur = Market, Rana = Bus Stand, and Bhat = School. That leaves Hospital and Highway for Verma and Singh.
Verma must be at Hospital or Highway, so Verma can take either. Singh cannot take Highway because his licence is suspended. Therefore Singh must take Hospital and Verma must take Highway.
Check every condition: Verma is at Highway (allowed); Bhat is at School, not Highway (allowed); Singh is at Hospital, which is not adjacent to Kaur at Market (allowed). No condition is violated.
The reasoning is elimination, not guessing: if Singh were at Highway, condition (vi) would fail; if Verma were at Hospital, then Singh would have to take Highway, which also fails. The unique assignment is Rana–Bus Stand, Kaur–Market, Verma–Highway, Singh–Hospital, Bhat–School.
2. Kaur reports sick and no other woman is available. Can the plan proceed as written? What would you do?
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The plan cannot be implemented as written because Market includes a women's help desk and Kaur is the only woman. Putting a male constable there is not a cosmetic change: women complainants may not come forward, and privacy during a search or statement is compromised.
Options in order: (1) request a female constable or home guard from the district reserve or nearest women's cell; (2) if none is available, ask the SHO to temporarily merge the Market help desk with the Bus Stand post and staff it with a female official from another unit; (3) do not simply drop the desk silently - record the shortage and inform control. Reassign the remaining four officers to cover Bus Stand, Hospital, Highway and School, with priority to Market and Bus Stand; the Highway and School beats can be covered by mobile patrol. The key is to escalate the gender-specific gap rather than fill it with an untrained volunteer.