MANGALORE: Taking cognisance of complaints of high-handedness and corruption against the members of the Dakshina Kannada District Anti-Rowdy Squad, the district police authorities here have disbanded it. The squad, initially set up in 1995 to combat the growing influence of rowdies, will be reconstituted in the next two weeks.

Inspector-General of Police (Western Range) H.N. Sathyanarayana Rao said that most of the squad's members had developed vested interests, as many of them had been there for eight to ten years. Their alleged partisan role during the recent communal riots in the district too had been taken note of, he said.

Use of `contacts'

Mr. Rao said that some of the personnel were reported to have used "their contacts" and "influence" to be retained in the squad. "While we had taken a similar decision regarding the squad when Pankaj Kumar Thakur was the Superintendent of Police, things had not gone this far then," he said, and added that an officer of integrity would be chosen to head the new squad, which would be under the direct control of the district SP.

Stating that steps have been taken to reconstitute the District Crime Intelligence Bureau (DCIB), Mr. Rao said that while some old faces had been retained in the bureau, efforts were on to select new faces here as well. Eventually, the entire bureau would be reconstituted and new faces would be brought in, he said

He added that the strength of the bureau would be trimmed to the sanctioned strength of eight posts. At present, there were 13 personnel in DCIB.

The wide-ranging changes made in the police department here would not, however, touch the third specialised police squad in the district — the Highway Patrol Squad (HPS) of the Panambur sub-division.

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