New Delhi: Amidst increasing political violence in poll-bound West Bengal, the Union Home Ministry has increased the security cover of around 50 politicians in the state. The decision was taken after the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) received the report from the Intelligence Bureau (IB) on the situation in the state.
According to sources, the IB report submitted to the MHA has stated that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders are under more threat in West Bengal.
In the last two weeks, around 33 VIPs have been provided Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) security, which also includes Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Nityanand Rai, who has now got the Z-category CRPF cover in the poll-bound West Bengal.
According to officials, around 8 to 10 CRPF personnel will be deployed for Nityanand Rai during his visit to the poll-bound state. However, in other states, he will be given protection by state authorities.
Nityanand Rai is a Z-category protectee in the Central list. BJP has appointed him as the central observer in West Bengal.
The names of other politicians who have been given security under X-category are - Prabir Ghoshal, Partha Chatterjee, Dr Rathin Chakraborty, Chandrashekhar Banerjee, Gautam Roy, Snehashis Bhowmik, Pranab Basu, Nityananda Chatterjee, Tapan Dutta, Subhash Sarkar, Tapasi Mondal, Ashok Kumar, Dipak Haldar, Sukra Munda, Dasrath Ticket, etc.
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In past months, former TMC MLAs Suvendu Adhikari and Rajib Banerjee, who have now joined BJP, have also been provided Z-category security cover by the CRPF.
As per the data published by the Bureau of Police Research and Development (BPR&D), West Bengal provided security to 3,142 VIPs in 2019, the highest among all states.
The BPR&D report on "Data on Police Organisations, 2019", stated that as many as 66,043 policemen were deployed to protect 19,467 ministers, MPs, judges, bureaucrats and other personalities in 2019, compared to 63,061 policemen for similar duty in 2018.
