Assam Police lays down 10-year reform plan

A seven-point road map covering diverse areas including law and order, training, delivery of public services, traffic management, metropolitan policing and adoption of technology has been prepared, Assam DGP Jayanta Narayan Choudhury told reporters here during an 'open house' session today.

"The scenario in the state has changed a lot since the 1980s and 1990s. The focus has to now shift from armed branch to civic policing," he said, adding, some progress has been achieved in areas like use of social networking sites, IT, training and promotions.

"However, a lot needs to be done," he said.

"We have a sanctioned strength of 65,000 personnel for civic police and of them 18,000 posts are vacant. Besides increasing manpower, we also need to increase the number of police stations and further enhance training skills," Choudhury said.

"We want to have a roadmap for the next 10 years ... We will seek suggestions from citizens and other stakeholders and send the final proposal to the government in three weeks or so."

The police is also proposing to give the power of investigation to assistant sub-inspectors. "Once approved, this will strengthen the number of investigating officers," he said.