MUMBAI: The Maharashtra government has taken steps to beef up security along the Maharashtra coastline, particularly after the recent terror attacks in Mumbai.
According to police sources, the state government will import 36 patrol vessels within the next three years. These high-tech state-of-the-art vessels would be imported because of delays in Indian ship building yards. “In the wake of the security scenario, there is urgency and hence we have, in principle, decided to import it through a proper tender bidding,” the sources said.
Each year 12 vessels would be imported. The vessels would have sophisticated navigation systems, advanced communication systems and the state-of-the-art weaponry, said a senior official of the state Home Ministry, who added that Indian Rupees 49 crore has been sanctioned for the first phase of the acquisition.
“The cost of a patrol vessel is about Indian Rupees four crore. The rest of the money would be spent on electronic systems and weapons on board,” he said.
Maharashtra has a coastline of 720 kilometers and enhancing coastal security has been accorded top priority as the ten terrorists, who carried out the four-day-long mayhem, used the sea route to enter Mumbai.
In another development, just four months ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) on Wednesday appointed R.R. Patil as the new Maharashtra state unit president. Patil took the reins from the outgoing president Arun Gujrathi.
Patil recently resigned as the state deputy chief minister and home minister accepting moral responsibility for the November terror attacks in Mumbai.
Patil was elected unanimously for the second time in the history of the NCP, in the presence of federal agriculture minister and NCP supremo Sharad Pawar at the party’s convention in Nagpur.
