Policemen to be trained in handling riot situations

Singed by the recent protests in which they were found struggling to tackle riot-like situation, Delhi Police will equip its men for a better performance in future. Karn Pratap Singh reports.

Singed by the recent protests in which they were found struggling to tackle riot-like situation, Delhi Police will equip its men for a better performance in future.

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Of the 35,000 teargas shells they have, most will expire in 2013. So the police are stocking up on more teargas and ordered 3,000 more shells. The ammunition that is ordered from BSF academy in Tekanpur will be available within a week's time.

The police are also planning to replace the existing "overweight" helmets with lighter ones that will have perspex visors to protect the face. A proposal to procure around 40,000 such helmets is being prepared.

They will also provide better training to their staff, especially the lower constabulary, on how to control situations of riots. Moreover, most police personnel had found it difficult to lob teargas shells properly. Some of the shells had misfired and a couple missed the target.

There were also complaints about malfunctioning of teargas launchers while police personnel were busy controlling the agitators, who had resorted to stone-pelting.

"Since training our police personnel for riot-like situations is not a regular process, we did fail to manage the situations properly. So we will train our staff the way the Rapid Action Force (RAF) personnel are trained," said a senior police officer. The formal training will start at police training college (PTC) at Jharoda Kalan within a week, he said.