13 years of 26/11: How prepared are we? – Hindustan Times

On January 5, 2009, two months after 10 sea-borne terrorists launched a deadly attack on Mumbai that left 166 people dead and 238 injured, the Maharashtra government issued a government resolution sanctioning funds to hire boats to patrol the coastline. Three police stations were notified as responsible for coastal policing their jurisdiction ranged from the seashore to 12 nautical miles off the citys 114-kilometre coastline.

In 2021, the Sagari police, as they are referred to, remains under-equipped. Even today, there are only three stations Yellow Gate police station in South Mumbai, Sagari 1 at Mahim and Sagari 2 at Gorai in North Mumbai whose mandate includes investigating and preventing crimes in territorial waters. To be sure, there are other stations whose jurisdiction involves patrolling the coastline, but their jurisdiction only extends to the shore.

While Yellow Gate police station responsible for the coastline between Sassoon docks and Vashi bridge and operating with a sanctioned strength of 152 personnel, including 12 officers was already tasked with policing the high seas before the 26/11 attack, the other two came up a few years after the terror siege.

Sagari I PS, which came up in 2012, has a sanctioned strength of 60 policemen and was tasked to look after coastal security between Sassoon docks and Juhu. Sagari II PS, which came up in 2013 was charged with keeping the northern coast of the city, between Juhu and Dahisar, secure. It has a sanctioned strength of 120 personnel.

The force has about 20 boats to patrol the coastline. In 2016, the Mumbai Sagari police acquired 10-speed boats eight equipped with 500 horsepower (HP) engines and two with 750 HP engines to patrol territorial waters; the rest patrol the shoreline. However, police officers said that only 12 (including speedboats) are operational. Some break down often, making it risky for policemen to patrol the sea beyond four nautical miles.

A senior IPS officer said that the boats have to be sent to the repair centre and spare parts come from the Goa shipping yard, a government facility.

A second officer said that at present, three working boats are allotted to the Yellow Gate police station and two each are allotted to Sagari I and Sagari II stations. A team of seven policemen one sub-inspector, three members of the constabulary, two technical staff members and the driver patrol the coast within their respective jurisdictions in the speed boats twice a day.

In the aftermath of the 26/11 attacks, the Mumbai police were also equipped with 18 amphibious vehicles (though they are called amphibious, they are not sea vehicles), which were distributed to the police stations on coastal areas including Gorai, Malwani, Versova, and Juhu.

With their wide tyres, these vehicles move easily on the sand and water. However, from 2013 onwards, some were seen parked at police stations. Some of these vehicles were working till 2014 and even in 2015, but after that, they became dysfunctional and have since been removed from police stations as well, said the second police officer.

A year after the 26/11 attacks, four Sea-Legs (boats with wheels that can also operate on the shore and road, but with limited speeds) were procured by the state government and provided to Girgaum, Dadar, Juhu and Versova police stations. They too stopped functioning after a few years.

I have not seen them functioning after 2013 because their parts were unavailable in India. Sea-legs were capable of moving on both land and water and could travel at over 40 knots in the water and over 10 km per hour on land, said a third senior police officer.

He said that the spare parts of these vehicles are not available in India.

In the latest move to upgrade the infrastructure of the existing Coastal security system, in 2018, the Maharashtra government decided to construct Marine Operation Rooms (MOR) at 10 major landing points of Mumbais coast, including Badhwar Park in Colaba where the 10 Lashkar-e-Taiba operatives on the night of November 26, 2008. These rooms are meant to serve as quick response posts for marine combat.

The formation of three MORs would be done on a pilot project basis at Sassoon Docks, Marve in Malad and near Bandra end of the Bandra-Worli Sealink, a senior Mumbai police officer had said ahead of the 26/11 anniversary in 2018.

Three years on, none of the MORs has come up.

We require at least two police personnel posted round-the-clock at each of these landing points. Currently, due to lack of staff, we are compelled to post one person at each of the points, that too without any support of modern equipment, said a third police officer.

Most importantly, we require more life jackets and bulletproof jackets which are currently in one digit per police station, he said.

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13 years of 26/11: How prepared are we? - Hindustan Times