Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), a paramilitary force which is mandated to keep the nation’s vital industrial installations and big private firms secure from threats like terror attacks, plans to push for more complex technologies to cut down on manpower, thereby lowering the security cost to their clients.Ironically, the development comes just a day after the Central government sanctioned 35,000 additional personnel for CISF to cater to the growing demand on the back of an increase in terror threat perception to vital national assets.
To start with, the agency is planning to start a pilot project at some of the steel plants including the ones at Durgapur, Bhilai and Bokaro, as a result of which these companies would be able save a significant amount of money on their security bills. The initiative will later be extended to CISF’s other clients.
“We have to reduce the cost of security and make optimum use of available technologies. The talks are on with the management, and if they agree, it will bring down the security bills significantly for them,” said O P Singh, DG, CISF, and former DG of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF).
About the technological measures that are expected to be undertaken as part of the plan, Manjit Singh, Deputy Commandant, CISF, said that each industry and project has its own specifications and requirements, and therefore, it cannot be standardised across all sectors. Sources claim that some of the measures will include enhanced coverage by CCTVs, creating perimeter walls around the boundaries, having more scanners, outsourcing some lower-end jobs to a third party agency, etc.
CISF also secures 59 civil aviation airports including those constantly on the terror radar like in Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, etc. Besides, it also provides services to several public sector undertakings and eight private enterprises including Infosys (Bengaluru), Electronic City (Bengaluru), Infosys (Mysuru), Infosys (Pune), RIL (Jamnagar), Coastal Gujarat Power Ltd (Mundra), Tata Steel (Kalinganagar), and Patanjali Food & Herbal Park (Haridwar). CISF till recently had a sanctioned capacity of 145,000 personnel though there was a demand for 2 lakh from the management. The capacity was increased to 1,80,000 personnel.
