The number of VIPs — ministers, MPs, MLAs, judges, bureaucrats, and private individuals — getting police protection reduced by at least 16% between 2016 and 2017, down from 20,828 to 17,468, according to data from a Union home ministry think-tank.
The report, by the Bureau of Police Research and Development (BPRD), shows that Uttar Pradesh has made the biggest reduction in the number of VIPs under police protection — from 1,901 in 2016 to just 110 in 2017. A large chunk of this reduction came after March 2017, when Yogi Adityanath came to power in the state following a massive victory in the assembly elections by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
In 2016, 4,681 UP Police officers were deployed for the security of 1,901 VIPs. This number reduced to 1,803 policemen for 110 VIPs (in 2017). On the other hand, police protectees in West Bengal and Punjab rose significantly between 2016 and 2017. In West Bengal, the number increased from 2,207 in 2016 to 2,698 in 2017; while in Punjab it rose from 1,852 in 2016 to 2,344 in 2017. To be sure, West Bengal has seen increasing political violence over the past few years and through much of 2017; Punjab saw several leaders of right-wing organisations being targeted by Khalistani terrorists. The data shows that the highest numbers of VIPs are in Bihar – at 3,052, despite a small decrease in the number of protectees from 3,200 in 2016.
To be sure, even though the number of VIPs getting police protection has come down significantly, the number of police personnel deployed for their security has increased marginally with 56,933 personnel deployed for 17,468 VIPs in 2017 — or roughly three policemen per person as against 56,900 for 20,828 VIPs in 2016.
On the other hand, an average of one police person was deployed in the country for every 663ordinary citizens in 2017, the BPRD data revealed. There were about 1.94 million police personnel in the country, while the total population in India on October 1, 2017, was estimated to be 1.29 billion. The BPRD report did not include VIPs under police protection in Jammu & Kashmir, Nagaland, Mizoram, Tamil Nadu and Arunachal Pradesh. In 2016, 2,075 persons in J&K were under police protection. In Delhi — where the police comes under the Union home ministry — 465 people had police protection in 2017, as compared to 489 in 2016, according to BPRD data.
