Battle over CISF deployment for airport security

Battle over CISF deployment for airport security
K. SUBRAMANIAN

SALEM, JULY 27: The fresh induction of Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) for airport security throughout the country replacing the state police personnel has created a rift between the CISF and the state police and crippled the Airports Authority of India, the only profit-making PSU in the Union Ministry of Civil Aviation, with an additional huge expenditure of nearly Rs 300 crores per annum.

The Union Home Ministry had decided to increase the strength of security personnel by two-fold in all the airports and to deploy the CISF and has instructed the Civil Aviation Ministry to carry out its orders in this regard.

Besides meeting the hefty wage bill for the CISF, the AAI has been asked by the Civil Aviation Ministry to carry out the hard task of providing basic facilities like rent-free accommodation, transport from residence to the airport and vice-versa which were not hitherto enjoyed either by the AAI staff or the state police who are on security duty at the airports. In addition, the AAI has also been asked to deposit Rs 12,000 per head for the CISF to be inducted at the airports.

Even though CISF had been deployed at 11 domestic airports, the two international airports of Chennai and Thiruvananthapuram out of the five in the country will be covered first. The security of the remaining three international airports of Mumbai, Delhi and Calcutta will be taken over by the CISF later so that the trained and experienced personnel can be posted to manage the maximum inflow and outgo of passengers in these airports. The CISF will be inducted in all the airports by end of next year.

Several state governments have expressed displeasure over the unilateral decision of the Union Ministry of Home Affairs to induct CISF for airport security as this would increase the financial burden of the states since hundreds of police personnel from the rank of Superintendent of Police or Deputy Commissioner to the Constable level who are now getting salary from the AAI have to be absorbed once again in the state. This will seriously affect further recruitment of policemen in the states and scuttle the promotion opportunities of policemen and lead to unemployment.

A top police official told The Indian Express that the CISF, which was basically an industrial security force, had not been trained in aviation security. Even with the two-fold increase in the number of CISF at the airports, the CISF is going to do the same security work being carried out now by the state policemen, he said.

The CISF had already locked horns with the state police at Rajkot andGuwahati airports where the state police refused to pull out in spite of the CISF taking over the security at these airports. The Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) has been asked to take up the matter with the state government.

A senior intelligence official said that the CISF had achieved great success in its its lobby with the Union Ministry of Home Affairs for providing single window service to PSUs following the Centre's decision to privatise several loss-making PSUs and the CISF to start with, had `entered' the profit-making unit of AAI and Prasar Bharati and signed the ``MoU'' with the user agency.

Inquiries reveal that the CISF, a `white elephant', will eat away the profits of the AAI and make it a `sick' unit within two years. The AAI which now maintains more than 100 airports, including five major international airports in the country, is already and finding it difficult to provide adequate facilities at the airports for the passengers may think of closing the small airports when it becomes sick. Otherwise, the AAI might go in for steep increase in the tariff on aircraft landing and other charges which would be passed on the shoulders of air passengers.