Police masterplan for transparent8217; encounters

After exhaustive discussions between senior officers a long list of do8217;s, and dont8217;s has been prepared. A sample: An encounter death must be supported by at least half-a-dozen cases against the man killed.

This will guard the police against the charge of gunning down innocent people. The department had faced a lot of embarrassing questions after Abdul Majid Noorani was shot dead in March this year. He was not as notorious as the police press release made him out to be.

u Every encounter must be accompanied with recovery of some sophisticated weapon from the gangster.

According to a Dubai-based gangster, police had seized eight imported pistols from five Abu Salem gang men who were arrested for their involvement in the attack on Rajiv Rai. However, in official records, seizure of only five weapons was shown. Why this was done is anybody8217;s guess.

Police have learnt this trick the hard way. After the encounter death of druglord Nari Khan at Kanjur Marg in August last year, they could only show the seizure of a country-made revolver of very poor make from him. Quite predictably, nobody bought their claim that the druglord was killed when he resisted his arrest.

u Number of encounter deaths must match the number arrests of hardcore gangsters, and the same should be publicised.

This will serve a dual purpose. While on one hand, it will make the encounters look genuine, on the other, once a gangster is booked it will become easier for the police to justify his death in an encounter later. Last week police arrested seven Chhota Shakeel aides in Bandra and three Chhota Rajan men in Chembur.

u A liberal policy in announcing rewards should be adopted.Earlier, police used to announce rewards very rarely. The liberal policy, however, is going to change this. While a reward of Rs 1 lakh on the head of Arun Gawli8217;s vazir, Sada Pawle, in September last year was not a part of this policy shift, the Rs 50,000 reward on Vijay Sharma, the alleged mastermind behind the attack on Rajiv Rai, certainly is.

u While firing in self-defence should continue, a warning before pressing the trigger will also be perfectly in order.

Police have often been asked by human rights activists as to how they manage to kill criminals with their outdated guns, when the gangsters are equipped with sophisticated automatic pistols? Now, more gangsters will be killed while they are riding a mobike or driving a car. The question of their retaliating does not arise. Just like Mushtaq Ansari was shot dead near Kala Niketan on Wednesday on his bike.

Apart from this, Mumbai police have also compiled a bulky dossier marked as gangs.8217; It8217;s an encyclopaedia on all the major underworld gangs and their splinter groups operating in the city. When a senior officer was inquired about the super plan, he neither confirmed nor denied it. However, he said, 8220;We always had a Masterplan to curb crime.8221;