Revolvers not for all

AHMEDABAD, June 14: In what is openly being discussed in police circles as a Tughlaq-like order, inspectors in the traffic branch and oth...

AHMEDABAD, June 14: In what is openly being discussed in police circles as a Tughlaq-like order, inspectors in the traffic branch and other non-executive posts have been asked to surrender their service revolvers immediately.

More than 80 per cent of them have already surrendered their revolvers amid murmurs of protest. The reason being given for the order is that since inspectors in the traffic branch and other non-executive posts 8212; such as the control room and special branch 8212; do not have to handle law amp; order situations, they don8217;t need to keep revolvers.

The more pressing reason, according to highly placed sources, is that the government wants to arm 125 newly posted sub-inspectors. Buying new revolvers could take time, hence the order.

Officers being disarmed are grumbling. An inspector who surrendered his weapon said being posted in a non-executive post did not mean that an officer wouldn8217;t need the weapon. 8220;He may have served in the crime branch before, or in the anti-terrorist squad, and might have had run-ins with criminals who may seek revenge.8221;

Another inspector said that it could not be said that traffic inspectors did not need weapons, for in the field they may have to face ugly situations and their being armed would deter attacks. He cited the example of the AMTS bus accident in Naranpura, after which a mob went on the rampage. He said the recent trend in Ahmedabad was for crowds to turn hostile at the slightest provocation. Although the director-general of police and the police commissioner of Ahmedabad declined having issued a cirular disarming officers in non-executive posts, Minister of State for Home Haren Pandya confirmed that it had indeed been issued.

Pandya said the government had recently given mass promotions and recruited several new police officers for field operations. Considering the priorities, the government was temporarily withdrawing service revolvers from some officers, he said.

Pandya said the priority was for arming officers in law amp; order postings.