Click to play videoMumbai/ New Delhi: The Mumbai Police’s leadership, which is supposed to guide the force all the times, has been criticised by a committee investigating their role during the terrorist attacks on the city on November 26 last year.
The Ram Pradhan Committee report doesn’t fix blame on any individual police officer for the force’s poor response to the attacks, but reprimands the then Police Commissioner and his office several times. IPS officer Hasan Gafoor, who is now chief of Maharashtra Police Housing and Welfare Corporation, has been accused of not providing overt and visible leadership when he was Mumbai’s police chief.
"On occasion of a crisis, such as the one Mumbai faced, the Police Commissioner should have been in the Command Centre in the Control Room which might have helped in better utilization of forces and prevented duplication of efforts by different police units," says the Pradhan committee’s report.
The report says there was poor cohesion and communication in the working of Police Commissioner's office. The police force didn’t get proper briefing from either its top leadership or the Mantralaya, the seat of Maharashtra’s government.
Gafoor was supposed to provide leadership to his force on November 26 but the report almost says he failed. "In evolving situations at different venues, the CP (commissioner of police) as head of crisis management or a designated spokesperson at the police HQ ought to have performed that task."
The Pradhan committee appreciates the initiative of younger police officers in facing the terrorists, but alleges senior officers for flouted standard operating procedures (SOPs) especially in crisis management.
"As a rule carefully prepared SOPs that draw upon experience and lessons of the past, should not be overlooked in crisis management. If each top officer, such as the CP or the DGP (director general of police) treats SOPs in cavalier manner, why have the SOPs at all?" it says.
The committee’s report ironically praises Rakesh Maria, Joint Commissioner (Crime), who was recently criticised in a book, To The Last Bullet, which has written by the wife of Ashok Kamte, the IPS officer killed by terrorists during the attacks.
"The committee has noted with appreciation the role played by Rakesh Maria in the C/R (control room) in handling a very serious crisis situation extending over three days"
Vinita Kamte, Ashok Kamte’s wife, disagrees with the committee's findings. "It is surprising to know the persons on whom the committee relied where mostly persons who were themselves interested in covering up the lapses," Vinita told CNN-IBN last week.
In the week leading to the first anniversary of Mumbai terrorist attacks, Gafoor alleged that certain senior police officers failed in their duties. He allegedly told the Week magazine that IPS officers Deven Bharti, Parambir Singh, K L Prasad and K Venkateshan were reluctant to be on the field during the attacks.
Gafoor later denied making those remarks, but the controversy cast a shadow on the Mumbai Police’s response to the terrorist attacks. The Pradhan committee’s report may further strengthen suspicion that the Mumbai Police was not united on the night when the city needed its guardians most.
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