By IANS,
Agartala : Vice President Hamid Ansari Wednesday conferred the President’s Colours on the Tripura Police, the fourth police force in India to receive the honour.
Ansari presented President’s Colours to Director General of Police Sanjay Sinha at Arundhutinagar police parade grounds near here at a colourful ceremonial function.
The vice president told the troopers that the triumph of the state forces can be followed by the security forces of other Indian states.
Appreciating the Tripura government for its direction of the state forces, Ansari said: “The troopers should work in close coordination with the society and the people at large to achieve their goal.”
Tripura Governor D.Y. Patil, Chief Minister Manik Sarkar and other dignitaries were present at the ceremony. Former state police chiefs G.M. Srivastava, K. Saleem Ali and Pranay Sahaya were also present.
State police spokesman Nepal Das told IANS: “Tripura Police is the fourth police force in India to be accorded the distinction after Jammu and Kashmir, Punjab and Tamil Nadu.”
“President Pratibha Patil had in April last year approved the union home ministry’s proposal to confer the President’s Colours to Tripura Police. But due to her busy schedule she could not come here and nominated the vice president to confer the honour,” said Das, a deputy inspector general.
Another police officer said the state police’s most elite unit, the Tripura State Rifles (TSR), has earned kudos from the prime minister and many state governments besides various central paramilitary forces for successfully stamping out terrorism.
The TSR has also discharged election-related duties in many states besides providing security at the Commonwealth Games in New Delhi in October 2010.
According to police records, insurgency in Tripura was at its peak in 2000, when 453 civilians and 61 security personnel were killed by separatist outfits.
With increased policing and mobilised political will, in 2009 only eight civilians and a security man were killed. Since last year, only one civilian has been killed by separatist guerrillas.
With the motto ‘Seva, Veerta, Bandhuta’ (Service, Courage, Friendship), the Tripura Police recently introduced a satellite-based system to track the movement of militants and criminals, apart from launching a method to register first information reports (FIRs) through SMSes.
The Tripura Police have also launched ‘Prayaas’, a multi-pronged community policing scheme to reach out to the people, root out crime against women and completely flush out terrorism.