State slams Centre for shifting coastal police institute to Gujarat

Maharashtra home minister RR Patil on Thursday slammed the Centre's decision to shift the site for setting up the National Institute of Coastal Policing from Palghar to Dwarka in Gujarat.

Maharashtra home minister RR Patil on Thursday slammed the Centre's decision to shift the site for setting up the National Institute of Coastal Policing from Palghar to Dwarka in Gujarat.

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He also dubbed the decision to shift the institute it as politically motivated and a move to please the Prime Minister Narndra Modi.

Patil accused the Centre of compromising with the security concerns of Mumbai, which has faced a series of terror attacks.

"The decision to shift has been taken by the Union home ministry to please the Prime Minister. This is a politically- motivated decision and does not fulfil the criteria put by the Centre," Patil charged.

"Palghar on the outskirts of Mumbai was the appropriate place for the proposed institute. It fulfilled all the Central government criteria that the place should be centrally located, near a city, in the deep sea and have a naval and coast guard base," Patil told reporters.

"Home ministry officials under the then Union home minister Sushilkumar Shinde had visited the site in Palghar and approved the same," he said.

Condemning the central government's decision, Patil said he would ask chief minister Prithviraj Chavan to convey that the decision to shift to Dwarka should be reconsidered.

The Institute will cater to training of security of west coast states of Kerala, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Goa, Gujarat on coastal policing, Patil said.

He said the new government at the Centre did not communicate to the state that its proposal has been scrapped but took a decision that Gujarat's proposal for setting up the institute has been accepted.