Calcutta, Aug. 27: Beware road Romeos. The sleuths are watching you.

Come September, Calcutta police’s detective department will step up vigil around the city’s schools and colleges ? the eve-teasers’ happy “hunting grounds”.

The decision was taken at a high-level meeting held at the Lalbazar police headquarters this week.

“We will initiate a drive against Romeos from the first day of September which will be continued till the institutions declare Puja holidays,” said Gyanwant Singh, the deputy commissioner (I) of police, detective department.

The move to bring eve-teasers under the police scanner was prompted by a spate of incidents of molestation in premier institutions in the city. The authorities of women’s colleges had spoken to senior police officers, requesting them to step up security.

Last month, a middle-aged man had entered the campus of Presidency College and chased a second-year student. A group of students went to Jorasanko police station and submitted a memorandum demanding police vigil in front of their college.

A few days later, a young man ? also an outsider ? allegedly entered Shyamaprasad College and kissed a first-year student. Immediately after the incident, the college authorities decided to check the identity of all youths waiting or loitering outside the institution.

A list of 16 schools and colleges has been prepared, where plainclothes policemen will be deployed. Apart from Presidency and Shyamaprasad, the list includes G.D. Birla Girls, Sri Shikshayatan, Modern High, Basanti Devi College and South Calcutta Girls’ College.

“Women’s colleges will be given first priority,” said Singh.

On the method of identifying teasers and arresting them, an officer of the detective department said: “The moment we notice youths roaming in front of the institutions, we will intercept them and ask them for explanations. If the police find the reasons not satisfactory enough, they will be arrested.”

Boys outside co-educational institutions will be asked to show identity cards and some suspects may be frisked.

It will be completely an undercover operation, the police said. “We may adopt different styles to lay traps that rogue youths will never imagine. So our warning for the Romeos is not to come to girls’ colleges and schools,” said an officer.