Assam, January 19 2009: ASSAM WILL get four counter-insurgency training schools for police and a good share of "redesigned" bullet-proof jackets � the kind that could have saved Hemant Karkare from terrorists' bullets.

The chief of the Bureau of Police Research and Development, K.Kaushik, today made the announcement about the schools, which will be part of 20 such institutions that the Centre has decided to set up across the country to impart specialised training to the police.

Kaushik, who is here to attend the three-day 39th All India Police Science Congress that begins tomorrow, said the Centre would provide "some monetary" help to the state for the schools, apart from providing trainers drawn from CRPF and commando training institutions.

Besides Assam, the schools would accommodate trainees from the other states of the Northeast.

The Centre has also asked the state police to raise a special protection force of its own on the lines of the National Security Guard (NSG), Kaushik said.

As part of its effort to revamp the police force, the home ministry is also procuring "redesigned" bullet-proof jackets.

The move came after Maharashtra anti-terrorism squad (ATS) chief, Karkare, was killed on the night the terror attacks began in Mumbai in November last year after being hit by bullets.

Kaushik said Karkare was hit just above his bullet-proof vest, prompting the ministry to procure the redesigned grade-III (improved version) jackets.

"In fact, the Bureau of Police Research and Development had requisitioned the jackets a few years ago when Kiran Bedi was its director, but because of bureaucratic red-tape, the procurement could not be made," he said.

Union home minister P.Chidambaram, Kaushik said, wanted to do things very fast and hence, 40,000 Grade III jackets have already been procured in the first phase.

The three-day Police Science Congress will also dwell on the key performance indicators for various posts, units, ranks in the police and on separation of law and order and investigation and its impact and implications.

Assam director-general of police, G.M.Srivastava, said during the media conference with Kaushik, that the arms recovered from a villager's house in Sadiya subdivision of Tinsukia yesterday was that of Ulfa's 28 battalion and was concealed before the two companies of the battalion came overground.

He said the police have been tipped off about the concealment of more such arms and ammunition.

The DGP also appealed to the villagers to voluntarily disclose to the police if militants had forced them to conceal arms in their house.

"Later on, during our search if we find more arms in their house, we will be forced to treat them as abettors," he added.

The arms would have been handed over to the new rebel recruits undergoing training in Myanmar, the police chief said.

Comment