'Police lack plans for procuring equipment'

Police have a wide range of procurement needs from arms and ammunition to uniforms but most of the states have no medium or long term projections about their resource requirement, a study has claimed.

The report – Procurement Transformation in Police Forces – prepared by Ernst and Young and industry body FICCI also notes that personnel in-charge of procurement are handicapped due to lack

of comprehensive guidelines.

At present, it said, most of the police forces have not prepared comprehensive tendering templates or checklist to streamline the procurement process though other government departments have developed system for it.

All state police forces have annual budget and acquisition plans but most of them shy away from preparing medium or long term financial projections, the study said.Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh are among the few states which had prepared five-year strategic plans but they too do not have any financial projections. However, the study said, Punjab has a financial projection and such projections of resource requirement can be very useful.

Releasing the report, Chhattisgarh Governor Shekhar Dutt said, informatics and technology have given a degree of irrelevance to time and distance. “Therefore, the essence and meaning of defence of India’s sovereignty is no more restricted to our frontiers and we also need to safeguard the psychological, institutional and societal planes of India simultaneously,” he said. Calling for having e-tendering and web-based contract management system, the study cited Karnataka Police’s e-procurement initiative which “revolutionised” the way the force conducted its tender process.