Secure VIPs properly, states told

NEW DELHI: As the poll campaign picks up heat, the Union home minister has instructed the states to follow a standardised drill for securing political rallies and ensure that all "threatened" VIPs are accorded protection as per their entitlement based on threat perception.

Union home secretary Anil Goswami on Friday summoned senior officials of the Central and state police agencies handling VIP protection, to review security arrangements for the poll campaign and ensure that precautions and procedures were followed uniformly across the states. A senior officer who attended the meeting told TOI that the emphasis was to get the "relatively lax" states like Uttar Pradesh and Punjab to give up their habit of not offering a visiting VIP security his entitled security cover.

"The emphasis was to standardize the security drill for campaign visits by VIPs and the rallies addressed by them. The security cover of a threatened politician must be the same irrespective of where he travels during the campaign. The states were asked to ensure that the requisite men, vehicles and equipment are deployed for protecting a VIP as per his security categorization, and proper sanitization of the approach roads and venue is carried out ahead of public meetings," said the officer.

Sources said representatives of various state governments were asked to cooperate with central agencies and forces in terms of the kind of security to be provided to a VIP while movement during and before elections. "Though security drills for VIPs are going to remain the same as in all elections, a greater thrust this time has been put on state police forces this time," said an officer privy to discussions on the matter.

With two Pakistani terrorists, allegedly preparing to attack election rallies, having been arrested recently by UP police, central security agencies assess a serious threat to VIPs during these elections. Indian Mujahideen and SIMI operatives had targeted a political rally organized by BJP's PM candidate Narendra Modi in Patna last year.

Security arrangements at the venue of the rally, the Gandhi Maidan, had been called into question at the time by Central agencies. Problems of coordination between central agencies and state police had left serious gaps in security that led to terrorists entering the venue with IEDs and planting them at various places at will.