To give more teeth to the state police force and equip it to better tackle the modern-day challenges of terrorism, policing, and law and order management in the border state, Punjab Cabinet on Wednesday gave its nod for restructuring of the Police Department under which Sexual Assault Response Teams (SARTs), and Family Counselling Units would be set up in all districts. The restructuring would also facilitate strengthening of the Prosecution Department, appointing Road Safety Associates, besides a mass recruitment of 5,000 new constables.

The restructured force, with 716 new critical posts against 820 existing non-essential or vacant ones, will focus more on the core areas of women safety, counter terrorism, crowd control and anti-riot, among others.

The restructuring process, to be conducted across verticals and functions in a revenue-neutral manner, will add robust to the manpower to enable it to more effectively handle policing, investigation, prosecution, among others.

The restructured force, which will witness the recruitment of 5000 new constables, will also provide for recruitment of civilian experts in fields like IT and Law, besides strengthening the Directorates of Prosecution and Litigation, Forensic Science Laboratory, Chemical Examiner, and Legal Remembrancer.

With women safety identified as a core thrust area for the department, the Cabinet has given the go-ahead to the establishment of SARTs in all the districts from within the sanctioned strengths in a revenue-neutral manner, without any additional financial implications, by re-designating the post of Sub-Inspector.

Similarly, it has also been decided to set up Family Counselling Units in all the districts, to handle crime cases against children and vulnerable groups.

While the smaller districts would have one team or unit each, the bigger ones would have more, said the state Director General of Police (DGP) Dinkar Gupta after the cabinet meeting. He added that these teams or units would be created by re-designating and re-training police officials for specialized functions.

In exercise of this decision, 34 Sub-Inspectors will be re-designated as SART in-charge and 34 as Counselling Coordinator, while 34 Constables would be re-designated as SART Counseling Officer, and another 34 as SART Crime Scene Officer. In addition, there shall be re-designated posts of 382 Assistant Child Protection Officers, 121 Cyber Crime Investigation Officers and 302 as Counselling Officers.

Further, it has been decided to re-deploy, transfer or attach 819 posts of constables (to be filled up through fresh direct recruitment of women) from the Armed Cadre to the District Cadre due to their greater cutting-edge utility in districts.

To improve conviction rate and for better delivery of criminal justice, especially in cases of heinous crimes, the Prosecution Department will be strengthened with the creation of 168 posts, while the Forensic Science Laboratory would get additional 84 posts and Chemical Examiner wing would be augmented by 12 posts.

The Legal Rememberancer would be provided 16 more posts under the restructuring process.

Given the increasing traffic volumes, especially in large cities, the Cabinet has also approved creation of 15 posts for hiring Road Safety Associates as consultants by the DGP at competitive market rates, after suitable price discovery has been completed. The DGP has also been authorized to engage 50 additional consultants from among civilian experts in departments such as IT and Legal, in view of the growing challenges of tackling specialized crimes.

In line with the global policing trends of deploying uniformed personnel for core policing duties, while inducting civilian staff for other related work, the Cabinet has given the go-ahead to the creation of 413 posts of Ministerial Staff for performing office work in the districts and at Police Headquarters.

TO SET UP SPV TO AUGMENT TECHNOLOGICAL CAPACITY AGAINST CROSS-BORDER TERROR

Amid increasing cases of smuggling of weapons and drugs via drone droppings in the border state, the Punjab Government has decided to enhance the counter terrorism capacity of its police force and establish a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) to augment its technological capacity to counter cross-border terrorism.  Part of the sweeping restructuring changes approved for the Punjab Police department on Wednesday by the state Cabinet, the SPV will be set up on the lines of Excise and Taxation Technical Services Agency (ETTSA), established by the state Excise Department. The Chief Minister, who shall be the SPV chairman as Minister in-charge, has been authorized to take further necessary steps to establish the SPV at the earliest possible.

DGP Dinkar Gupta said that the SPV will work on establishing a Unified Communication Network of senior police or civil officers, besides undertaking the development and deployment of an Online Intelligence Sharing Platform in the state. It will also work on setting up a State Grid as a network of databases about arms, arms license holders, arms dealers, vehicles, suspects, passports etc.

In addition, the SPV has been envisaged as a vehicle for the creation of a Realtime Crime Centre, involving mining of data analytic applications, integrated with current databases to allow for more proactive responses and achieve operational objectives of the State Police. It will be further tasked with finding an efficacious and powerful solution for enabling proper information storage, collation, analysis, sharing, and retrieval of data. GIS Mapping of the State is another key agenda for the SPV.

TO AUGMENT POLICE DEPT’S COUNTER-TERRORISM CAPACITY

The Cabinet also sanctioned augmentation of the Police department’s Counter Terrorism capacity by reducing the age profile of 01 Commando Battalion by filling up vacant posts with newly recruited Constables and re-deployment of existing manpower within the Armed Cadre. Young and directly recruited constables, with remarkably high physical standards, would be given specialized training and inducted in these Battalions.

OKAYS RULES TO REGULATE CASH TRANSPORTATION BY PRIVATE SECURITY AGENCIES

To regulate cash transportation by private security agencies, Punjab cabinet okayed the notification of the Punjab Private Security Agencies (Private Security to Cash Transportation Activities) Rules, 2020.

“Punjab Government has decided to strengthen the security mechanism for all cash transportation activities in the State by regulating all private security agencies engaged in such activities under the umbrella of the Private Security Agencies (Regulation) Act, (PSARA) 2005,” said the spokesperson adding that the Cabinet, in a virtual meeting, approved to notify the Rules in pursuance of PSAR Act, 2005, which did not specifically cover the activities of the cash transportation agencies.

SEPARATE CADRES FOR SCERT, DIET PERSONNEL

To enhance efficiency in the functioning of Directorate of State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT) and District Institutes of Education Training (DIETs), the Cabinet gave approval for the creation of separate cadres of their personnel.  It was decided to notify separate rules for personnel of SCERT or DIETs, an official spokesperson said after the Cabinet meeting, which accepted the proposal mooted by the School Education Department in this regard. Currently, all the personnel of both SCERT and DIET are deputed from Directorate of DPI (School Education).

PUNJAB STATE DATA POLICY OKAYED FOR OPTIMAL USE OF DATA FOR GOVERNANCE

To digitally empower Punjab’s residents, the Cabinet has approved the Punjab State Data Policy (PSDP) to track progress and to provide citizens greater and efficient access to services. 

The PSDP would be instrumental in leveraging data and technology to optimize service delivery and citizens’ access and participation through user friendly and secure e-Governance systems.

The data would be efficaciously utilized for evidence-based policy making and programme decision making.  The Cabinet also gave a nod to notify PSDP for creating a unified and interoperable data infrastructure for the state. “With this, Punjab has now become one of the first states in the country to formulate a comprehensive data policy,” said the spokesperson.

PUNJAB TO IMPLEMENT MATA TRIPTA MAHILA YOJNA TO EMPOWER WOMEN-HEADED HOUSEHOLDS; TO BENEFIT OVER 7.96 LAKH

To empower the women-headed households in the State, the Cabinet on Wednesday gave go ahead to implement Mata Tripta Mahila Yojna. Pertinently, Punjab has 54,86,851 households, (Census 2011) out of which 7,96,030 households are headed by women. The objective of this new policy is to empower women-headed households (WHH) in Punjab, who is an adult female and the sole or main income earner and decision-maker.

It is estimated that an additional allocation of Rs 177.1 crore per annum, including Rs five crore for IEC activities, would be required from the year 2021-22 for new interventions and also for dissemination and outreach programmes to cover all the eligible beneficiaries. Under this scheme, the head of the household must be a widow, deserted woman, separate, divorced, or unmarried woman, and she must be the sole earning member in the family.