Dogs, horses to control unruly sports fans

RANCHI: With mega sporting complexes coming up in Jharkhand that would attract crowds in thousands, the police is gearing up to meet unruly fans by taking help of animals in future sporting events.

It would take at least six months to train a dog squad and the mounted police on crowd controlling, inspector- general of police-cum-spokesman S N Pradhan, said.

However, he said that it would not be possible to put into service the elite forces for the (34th) National Games. But they would be certainly ready for future sporting events.

''You can see how mounted police and sniffer dogs assist the police in controlling the crowd during matches in Kolkata's Eden Gardens,'' Pradhan cites as an example.

A number of international standard stadia involving approximately Rs 1,000 crore are coming up in Ranchi giving it a prospective centre for national and international games starting from kabbadi to cricket.

Apart from the existing dog strength, the police department has recenlty got sanction for procuring 50 more of the species for assisting the police in their various tasks.

''We have decided to give trained dogs to the special task force the members of which are scouring the hilly terrains on the scent of Maoists and extremists of other organisations,'' Pradhan said.

As soon as an adequate number of trained dogs are ready, they will be used for crowd control along with the mounted police,'' he said.