Para-military forces sought

By Our Special Correspondent

CHENNAI, OCT. 10. The Tamil Nadu Government has asked the Centre to provide 71 companies of para-military forces to augment security for the two-phased civic elections. The Government has also written to Karnataka, Kerala and Andhra Pradesh, besides a northern State, requesting them to send 10-12 companies each for bandobust at 78,558 polling stations and 9224 counting centres.

The Home Secretary, Mr. Naresh Gupta, told newsmen here today that indications were the Centre would not be able to spare CRPF companies. Hence Tamil Nadu requisitioned the services of police from other States.

For its part, the Government drafted 38,000 police personnel, 7,000 home guards, 1,000 retired policemen, 1,500 fire services personnel, 15,000 NSS volunteers and 13,000 ex- servicemen, besides one company of the Tamil Nadu Special Police in each district.

Since the elections were being held in every district in two phases, deployment of personnel became easier, Mr. Gupta said.

BSF for Veerappan mission

While Karnataka urged the Centre to redeploy the Border Security Force in the mission for nabbing Veerappan, Tamil Nadu was still considering whether it should press for the BSF returning to the forests.

The Government decided to consult Karnataka and Joint Special Task Force officials before taking a decision on writing to the Centre, the Home Secretary said.

There was still ``an element of doubt'' whether the BSF was an ``absolute necessity'' for the successful completion of the mission, Mr. Gupta said. There were ``conflicting views''. The Centre recently pulled out the BSF personnel involved in the search operations in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka forests, in view of the security requirement in the newly-carved State of Jharkhand.

Though the Tamil Nadu and Karnataka Governments wanted to retain the BSF, the Centre turned down the plea.

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