4,000 Gurgaon cops, only 17 bulletproof jackets

The Gurgaon police has only 17 bulletproof jackets for its 4,000 personnel and have not made a single purchase of the safety gear in the past 10 years, an RTI reply has revealed

The Gurgaon police has only 17 bulletproof jackets for its 4,000 personnel and have not made a single purchase of the safety gear in the past 10 years, an RTI reply has revealed.

A Special Weapons And Tactics (SWAT) team of the Gurgaon police carried out a safety drill on Wednesday but the lack of adequate equipment puts a question mark on their real-time preparedness. (Photo Courtesy - Gurgaon Police)

The RTI also revealed that the Gurgaon police has a sanctioned strength of 4,823 personnel to ensure the safety of residents but, currently, only 3,949 personnel are working round the clock .

Aseem Takyar, the activist who filed the RTI in November last year, has sought information about the status of the safety measures taken by the Gurgaon police.

He said, “After the terrorist attack at the Dina Nagar police station in Gurdaspur, Punjab, I got to know that the Punjab police, at the time of the incident, did not have any bullet-proof jackets. I received information that the Gurgaon police too was short on safety equipment. Thus, I filed an RTI. The reply revealed that the city police has only 17 bullet-proof jackets and that none has been bought in the past 10 years. The police force is also facing a severe staff crunch.”

The mock drill was organised to check the police preparedness in the city following a terrorist attack at the Pathankot Air Force station on Saturday that left seven security personnel dead. The siege continued till Monday and the armed forces were able to neutralise six attackers.

When asked about the lack of safety equipment with the police force, Navdeep Singh Virk, Gurgaon commissioner of police, said, “Bulletproof jackets are an urgent requirement for our SWAT teams. We do have some jackets but they are not enough and we have a requirement for more. I have sent the proposal for procuring more bulletproof jackets for our personnel along with modern strike weapons.”