Uniform
With the establishment of the Ceylon Police in 1866 a standard uniforms based on the ones of the British police forces were adapted. Officers of the grade of Inspector and above who were mostly British wore white colonial uniforms which are still used today for ceremonial occasions. Constables wore dark blue tunics, shorts and a black round cap with a collar number. Khaki uniforms were adapted by the beginning of the 20th century for practical reasons along with other military and police units of the British Empire. This was common for all ranks with the constables wearing Khaki tunics, shorts and hat while always armed with a baton until 1974.
Current standard of uniforms comes from the last major changers made in 1974, however several additions have been made since then for practical reasons. The old white uniform still remain as the full-dress uniform of Gazetted Officers, only worn for ceremonial occasions. This includes white tunic; trousers (or skirt); medals; adorned with black epaulettes with ran insignia, a black leather cross belt with the lion head badge with whistle and chain, police badge affixed black leather pouch and sword with a white coloured pith helmet. Senior gazetted officers may wear a waist sash in gold colour instead of cross belt. Mounted officers wear a red tunic for ceremonial occasions with a gold cross belt, a black custodian helmet, gazetted officers carry swords and constables carry lances with a police pennant.
No.01 khaki uniform is worn for most formal occasions. No.01 khaki uniform consists of a khaki jacket adorned with black epaulettes (for gazetted officer), white shirt, black tie with khaki trousers or a skirt, black coloured peaked cap and medals. No.02 khaki uniform is the normal working uniform of all police officers. No.1 khaki uniform consists of a khaki shirt (both long sleeve or short sleeve), with khaki trousers or a skirt, black coloured peaked cap and medals ribbons. Senior gazetted officers of and above the grade of superintendent wear black "gorget patches" on all types of uniforms. Gazetted officers tend to wear a short sleeve tunic like "bush jacket" as part of their No.02 khaki uniform. Black sam browne belts are worn by gazetted officers with traffic policemen wearing white coloured peak caps and the white belt with sam browne belts on their khaki uniforms. Constables and sergeants wear their service number on their uniform. For practical reasons overalls of green or black may be worn with boots when necessory.
Special Task Force personnel usually wear khaki uniforms which are a bit lighter in colour. They tend to wear a camouflage uniform with boots and bright green coloured beret.
Read more about this topic: Sri Lanka Police
Famous quotes containing the word uniform:
“Iconic clothing has been secularized.... A guardsman in a dress uniform is ostensibly an icon of aggression; his coat is red as the blood he hopes to shed. Seen on a coat-hanger, with no man inside it, the uniform loses all its blustering significance and, to the innocent eye seduced by decorative colour and tactile braid, it is as abstract in symbolic information as a parasol to an Eskimo. It becomes simply magnificent.”
—Angela Carter (1940–1992)
“The sugar maple is remarkable for its clean ankle. The groves of these trees looked like vast forest sheds, their branches stopping short at a uniform height, four or five feet from the ground, like eaves, as if they had been trimmed by art, so that you could look under and through the whole grove with its leafy canopy, as under a tent whose curtain is raised.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Thus for each blunt-faced ignorant one
The great grey rigid uniform combined
Safety with virtue of the sun.
Thus concepts linked like chainmail in the mind.”
—Thom Gunn (b. 1929)