For the first time, coastal police to get own jetty near Mazgaon docks

The coastal wing of the Mumbai police will get its own dedicated jetty at Lakda Bunder, costing ₹34 crore, to improve patrolling in the Arabian Sea. A second jetty at Worli is also planned. The move comes after the police were given high-speed boats post the 26/11 terror attacks, but had no jetty to board from. The new precinct will also have a boat-repairing yard, workshop, and boat-parking yard. The Mumbai police have plans to buy Immediate Support Vessels in the future.

MUMBAI: For the first time in its long history, the coastal wing of the Mumbai police is set to get its own dedicated jetty at Lakda Bunder near the Mazgaon docks with a proper office and a police station as well. The entire project will cost ₹34 crore. On the anvil is a second jetty at Worli, off the coastal road.

For the first time, coastal police to get own jetty near Mazgaon docks

The move has been initiated by the state home department to help the police improve patrolling in the Arabian Sea, which is crucial for the coastal security of the city. Hitherto, the city police would board vessels from Ferry Wharf, the Gateway of India and the Bandra-Worli sea link.

Soon after the 26/11 terror attacks, the Mumbai police got high-speed boats. They did not have a yard, and hence a plot owned by the Mumbai Port Authority at Lakda Bunder was given to them. But in the absence of a jetty, they could not board vessels there.

Lakda Bunder is located on the eastern coast of Mumbai, and is important because the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre is also located here. The new police precinct will also have a boat-repairing yard, a workshop and a boat-parking yard. The police also wanted to have a breakwater but environmentalists opposed this. The entire project will be executed by the Maharashtra Maritime board.

The Mumbai police have 23 boats, all docked at Lakda Bunder, where maintenance work is also carried out. At present, the police have interceptor boats but they are small ones. Soon, the state police have plans to buy Immediate Support Vessels, which are bigger boats like those used by the Indian Navy, which can travel into the deep seas. The Mumbai police have a mandate to patrol the seas from the coast to five nautical miles inside.

A police officer attached to the coastal police said, “At present, we don’t have a jetty of our own. We would use Ferry Wharf, the Gateway of India or a broken jetty of the Bandra-Worli sea link, which was very inconvenient. Once we have our own jetty, we can utilise the Lakda Bunder jetty. For the western coast, BMC contractors have constructed a jetty for the coastal road, which, after completion of the latter, will be handed over to the Mumbai police and Coast Guard for their exclusive use.”

The officer added that they had been chasing the Lakda Bunder jetty proposal for a long time, and it was finally sanctioned by the Maharashtra Coastal Zone Management Authority last week.