India has a history of communal violence. Isolated incidents often engulf whole cities and districts, with political parties stoking and then exploiting communal tensions. The population density and ill-planned settlements in Indian towns and cities make managing these outbreaks and preventing injuries and deaths very difficult. The ten battalions of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF)’s Rapid Action Force (RAF) are specially trained to mobilize at short notice and contain sudden violence.

Under India’s Constitution, states maintain law and order. Therefore, the federal government can only deploy forces like the RAF at the request of state governments. While the federal government’s hands are tied, the state governments are wary of alienating Hindus, who form the majority in most states and often foment communal tensions. As a result, political calculations often affect whether or how quickly states call for CRPF intervention.

Although the CRPF predates Independence, the RAF came into being much later. Formed in 1991, it became operational in October 1992. After the 1984 assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards, her supporters rioted, killing scores of Sikhs in Delhi. During 1989’s Bhagalpur riots in Bihar, hundreds died after those taking part in a Hindu procession claimed they came under attack from Muslims. Both tragedies underscored the system weakness in stanching these crises. These situations arose from authorities looking the other way and refusing to intervene quickly with adequate resources and personnel.

Founded by the federal government to deliver higher-level crisis response, the RAF got off to a rough start. Just months after the RAF announced its readiness to rein in riots, thousands lost their lives in December 1992. Hindu extremists demolished the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya, Uttar Pradesh. Hindus contend Babri sat where the historic Ram Janmabhoomi Temple once stood. Riots broke out in Delhi, Mumbai and other cities. In the ensuing violence, more than 2,000 people, mostly Muslims, died.

Ten years later, more than a thousand people died during 2002 Gujarat riot. The RAF arrived nine hours after the carnage began. But they were also constrained by the response of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi who reportedly said, “Let the Hindus vent their anger.” Gujarat exposes the RAF's core challenge, waiting for the affected state to call for them. 

Response time remains a problem. After riots in Assam between ethnic Bodos and Bengali Muslims in late summer 2012, Muslims in Bangalore began attacking people from India’s Northeast. As usual, the RAF’s response was slow.

RAF is a specialized wing of the CRPF, which reports to the federal government’s Ministry of Home Affairs. The states seek the services of the CRPF and RAF when they are unable to meet the policing needs with their own units. Apart from being deployed when violence erupts, RAF also preempts unrest in large gatherings of people, such as during festivals or demonstrations. While RAF units are trained to respond quickly to calls to action, their effectiveness often depends on how well the state police assess a developing law and order situation. RAF personnel have also taken part in various peacekeeping missions abroad.

Attached organizations

Central Reserve Police Force

The CRPF, called the Crown’s Representative Police during British rule, is the RAF’s parent organization. The Central Armed Police Forces’ (CAPF) largest division, it comprises 207 battalions. About 66 battalions are based in Kashmir, working alongside the state police, the army and another CAPF, the Border Security Force, to guard the state from a Pakistan-sponsored insurgency. CRPF battalions also battle Maoists in the eastern states of Chhattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa and West Bengal.

Like all of India’s military units, detailed information on the RAF’s budget is scarce. The government has now plans to upgrade the RAF’s riot gear, with shock shields, laser dazzlers, long-range acoustic device, water mist firefighting system, and disposable handcuffs. It would cost in excess of $4,000 to arm each of the around 10,000 RAF personnel. Besides a long-range acoustic device costs about $55,000 and the water mist firefighting system another $5000, both of which would be allotted to RAF units. Judging by the supply tenders publicized by the RAF, the force spends a significant chunk of their budget on infrastructural improvements like improving barracks and portable toilets, large equipment purchases like converting a Tata van into an anti-riot vehicle and essentials like food and cooking equipment.

RAF Wearing UN Helmets in Kashmir

In the summer of 2010, protests and unrest gripped Kashmir. The state called in the RAF. Facing off with demonstrators, the RAF wore UN-marked powder blue helmets and shields, leading locals to conclude the UN sided with the Indian troops, who stood accused of excessive force, indiscriminately firing tear gas canisters at and lathi charging protestors.

On August 9, Paul Barrow of the U.S.-based advocacy group, United Progressives, informed the United Nations Public Affairs Chief Nick Birnbeck that the RAF was wearing the helmets, which violated UN regulations. Birnbeck forwarded the complaint to another UN staffer who ordered Indian forces not to use UN Riot gear

The use of UN blue, an international symbol of a peacekeeping force, seemed especially inappropriate since the RAF and various other government forces killed over 100 protestors in 2010.

After the UN expressed disapproval, CRPF spokesperson Prabhakhar Tripathi dismissed the controversy. “The helmets and the other things were provided to the RAF by the UN when the contingent was on a peacekeeping mission,” he told The Telegraph. “There is nothing wrong in using them here.”

UN Orders Indian Army to Stop Using UN Helmets (by Paul Barrow, United Progressives)

Indian Forces Told to Stop Wearing UN Helmets in Kashmir (The Guardian)

Caught in UN Helmet, CRPF Scratches Head (The Telegraph)

Moradabad Riots

For more than two centuries, Muslims and Hindus a village called Sahaspur in Uttar Pradesh’s Moradabad district has exemplified peaceful coexistence of. In fact, it has been the Muslims who take the lead in celebrating Hindu festivals such as Dussehra and Holi. But since February 16, 2011, when the Muslims took out a procession on the occasion of Barawafat in this village that has some 8,000 Hindus and 7,000 Muslims, things haven’t been the same. That day, the procession couldn’t take the traditional route because of the damage to the roads. They were following an alternative route that the Hindus themselves had suggested, accompanied by the sub-divisional magistrate (SDM), when a few Hindu men stopped them. Initially, the SDM appeared convinced that the procession could continue after having a word with the Hindu men but upon getting a call on his mobile phone, he changed his mind. The Muslims, surprised, began arguing with the SDM. At this point, stones were pelted at the procession from the rooftops of nearby Hindu homes. The Muslims threw stones back at the pelters. In the commotion, a 12-year-old Muslim was seriously injured; he would die the next day. The RAF was called in but all they did was to fire tear gas shells, break in to Muslim homes, assault women and children and arrest the men, while the Hindu men stole their belongings.

PVCHR Appeal against Fabrication and Repression against UP Muslims (Situations Asia)

Moradabad Riot of Feb. 2011: Report of Fact-finding Team of CHR (TwoCircles.net)

This Dussehra Flourishes on Hindu- Muslim Unity (by Neha Tara Mehta, Mail Today)

Brutalizing Kudankulam Nuclear Protesters

In the late 1980s the government picked Kudankulam on Tamil Nadu's southern coast for a 2,000-megawatt nuclear plant, the largest in India. But when construction finally began in 2001, neighbors claimed the government hadn't consulted them before approving the project. A million people live within a 30-kilometre radius of the plant, making evacuating during a leak difficult. 

The protests grew more urgent in the wake of earthquake in Japan in March 2011. Measuring 9.0 on the Richter scale, the quake caused a tsunami, disabled the cooling system at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, which leaked radiation.  

A year later, protests continued. Even though protesters use peaceful means like hunger strikes, the government has lost patience as the commissioning date nears. Wary of losing the 2.5 billion already spent on the project and being unable to meet the energy demands of a growing economy, the government has banned protests near the plant. The Rapid Action Force and state police units deployed to keep defiant protestors away have often resorted to firing teargas shells and sometimes firing in the air. A protestor was recently shot to death. The police have also been accused of detaining the protestors on false charges.

In Kudankulam, Waiting for the Government to React (by Anupama Chandrasekaran, New York Times)

One killed in Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant Protests (by S. Murari, Reuters)

Cops Clash with Villagers Near Kudankulam Site (Business Standard)

Two Anti-nuclear Protestors in India Detained (Amnesty International)

Localize Emergency Response

Since the RAF personnel have often been guilty of lacking an understanding of local conditions and sensitivities and of failing to prevent peaceful protests turning violent. Since the local police know an area and its people better than anyone else, the federal government should, perhaps, focus on training the local police personnel to quell protests and riots. With the state governments in no mood to give up their powers on law and order and the existing poor coordination between them and federal government, a better-equipped state police could be the solution.

Especially now when rumors spread like wildfire through mobile phones and the Internet, as was evident from the August 2012 attacks on Northeast community in mainland India, a self-sufficient state police unit becomes all the more essential.

Time For Police Reform (Midday)

Bangalore: Central Forces Conduct Flag March; Exodus To NE Ebbs (Times of India)

Distinguish state RAF’s from federal RAF’s

In recent years, many states and municipalities have founded their own Rapid Action Force. An incident in 2008 best illustrates how confusing this can be. An RAF unit arrived in West Bengal’s Howrah to disperse a mob. The personnel wore the same blue uniform but it wasn’t CRPF’s RAF, it was a unit of the Kolkata police. Senior CRPF officials would later make their displeasure known to the Ministry of Home Affairs in New Delhi. This could create confusion, they said, and pointed out that the Kolkata police didn’t heed specific instructions from the ministry.

CRPF Worried As States Create Their Own Rapid Action Force (by Vinay Jha, Indian Express)

Who Should Control Crisis Response?

The Congress-led federal government wants more central control of law and order, especially with mounting communal violence and terror attacks. It introduced two bills in the Parliament, the Communal Violence Bill and the National Counter Terrorism Centre Bill, but both were rebuffed for trying to undermine states’ powers. It is now harder than ever for the federal government to work with the states as regional and other national parties that don’t belong to alliance ruling the center now rule many of the states. Those days when Congress ruled in the center as well as in most states is firmly in the past. The distrust between the federal government and the states, however, augurs ill for the RAF and other CAPF.

More Power to the Center

The Mumbai attacks of 2008, when 10 heavily armed Pakistani men sailed through Indian waters, stepped ashore and went about shooting people at will, showed an inept Indian security apparatus. Earlier, in 2002, during the Gujarat riots, it took the RAF nine hours to arrive at the scene of a horrific massacre. Also, investigations into terror attacks that often involve more than one state have thrown up conflicting theories and hampered progress. So, it makes sense for a powerful federal government to ensure coordination between security agencies of the different states.

Genocide in Gujarat: Government and Police Complicity (Asian Human Rights Commission)

NCTC Won't Tread on Your Toes, Chidambaram Assures States (by Vinay Kumar, The Hindu)

An Attack on Federalism

The opposition parties that are in power in several states haven’t taken kindly to the Congress-led federal government’s attempt to form overarching authorities to prevent communal violence and terror attacks. “Federalism is under attack ... be it NCTC … Communal Violence bill ... the Congress is taking all powers of state and so all parties are opposing it. If given freedom, even Congress chief ministers will oppose them,” said Prakash Javadekar, spokesperson for Bharatiya Janata Party, the main opposition party in the Parliament.

India Divided over Communal Violence Bill (by Sudha Ramachandran, Asia Times Online)

‘NCTC: Cong Taking away Powers of States’ (Zee News)

Pranay Sahay

Pranay Sahay served as director general October 2012 to July 2013. A 1975-batch IPS officer, he previously ran the Seema Sashastra Bal (SSB). He also served in the CRPG as the additional director general in charge of the North Zone.

K Vijay Kumar

K Vijay Kumar was the CRPF general director from 2010 to 2012. A native of Kerala, he was born in 1950. A 1975 IPS batch officer, he hit the limelight after his Tamil Nadu Special Task Force finally killed the notorious ivory and lumber smuggler Veerappan in 2004. The mustachioed Veerappan had terrorized rural areas in Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu for three decades. His efforts as the CRPF DG to rein in Naxal violence were appreciated by the government, considered giving him an advisory role in implementing its development programs in the Naxal-affected districts. On December 11, 2012, Kumar was appointed as a Senior Security Adviser in the Home Ministry.

Vikram Srivastava

Vikram Srivastava was Director General of the Central Reserve Police Force from February 2010 to October 2010. He is a 1973 batch Uttar Pradesh cadre IPS officer. Before his appointment at CRPF, he served as the Director General of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police. Srivastava led the CRPF in April 2010 when Maoists killed over 70 CRPF personnel in ambush at Dantewada, Chhattisgarh. His removal in as DG in October 2010 was widely seen as punishment for Dantewada. He currently serves as the Chief of the Bureau of Police Research and Development.