Short of staff, police may find it tough to maintain law, order
KARNAL: Faced with an acute shortage of cops, the Haryana police department will find it difficult to maintain the law and order situation in the wake of the upcoming verdict in the Dera Sacha Sauda chief rape trial case
The department has failed to fill vacant posts despite having faced law and order problems several times in the past few years. Whenever faced with shortage of staff, the state government largely depends on para military forces to maintain law and order in case of emergency as there are not enough police personnel in the districts.
Sources said the state police department has a total sanctioned strength of about 62,000 personnel, including the armed police, but it has only 42,000 personnel on its roll.
Figures reveal that most of the districts have only 1,100- 1,400 cops against the requirement of about 3,000. The number of policewomen in most of the districts is around 50. To maintain law and order, the government has allowed the district police to appoint home guards jaw an sand special police officers. Sources said Kaithal district has only 1,100 cops, 1,200 each in Kurukshetra and Yamunanagar and 1,500 in chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar’s segment Karnal.
Even a major district like Gurgaon is facing a shortage of about 900 cops, raising questions over the safety and security of people, especially women, as women personnel comprise only 6.35% share in the state police.
In Rohtak district, which was the epicentre of the Jat agitation last year in which 31 people died and public and private properties of several crores were set afire, about 1,000 posts of cops are vacant. To bridge the gap, the state government had started the recruitment of constables this year and even changed the recruitment by revising the minimum height eligibility formal es in general category from 172 cm to 170cm. State director general of police (DGP) BS Sandhu could not be contacted despite repeated attempts.