Security forces take part in mock drill

Nearly 700 officials from the police, Navy, Coast Guard and Customs have received training in tackling terror in a two-day mock drill at 70 spots along Maharashtra’s coast that have been identified as terror-prone areas.

During the drill, officials were supposed to react and fight back after getting a dummy call of intrusion and a study will be conducted later on areas in their security system that they should review.

The excise, which began on April 27, is part of the Sagar Kawach project and it is carried out twice a year to review coastal security, preparedness and to take stock of weak areas, keeping the deadly 26/11 terror attacks in mind. Under this project, Sagari police stations were formed to patrol the sea and identify crucial coastal points.

In Mumbai, areas such as Colaba, Gateway of India, Bandstand, Sewri, Marve and Malad, Juhu, Mahim, Worli, Dadar and Khar were included in the exercise, sources said.

During the drill, marine forces in dummy boats posed as attackers and security agencies had to identify, trace and stop them. However, according to defence sources, during the drill, each security agency intentionally operated in isolation and avoided exchanging inputs to prevent leakage of information. Officials suspect that due to this, they might have missed a few dummy infiltrators.

Speaking about the drill, Kiran Kumar Chavhan, DCP, port zone told The Asian Age, “An exercise was conducted for two days, and now we will review all the observations made on coast security preparedness.”

During the drill observations were made and plus and minus points were identified and the Coast Guard will review the report and later it will be handed over to chief secretary, a Coast Guard source said.

A police official, commenting on the exercise, said police stations operating in the areas were involved in the drill and were trained to identify suspicious persons and objects in the sea. According to other sources, the drill has reflected that coordination between maritime security agencies and the state has improved to an extent.

In November last year, a similar exercise was carried out where five teams successfully managed to infiltrate five different spots in the city, according to the sources.