Delhi Police to plant dummy IEDs to check alertness of cops

New Delhi: The Delhi Police's Special Cell will plant dummy IED bombs in high footfall areas to check the alertness of its sleuths during the festive season, sources said on Tuesday.

While the public will be awarded for helping the police detect and defuse the dummy explosives, departmental action will be taken against those police personnel who fail to detect the device, they said The Special Cell staff will randomly plant the dummy IEDs at high footfall areas in each of the 15 districts as directed by Police Commissioner Sanjay Arora during an internal meeting, they said.

With the start of the festive season, Arora has directed that the local police should sensitise all stakeholders, including security people, shopkeepers and resident welfare associations among others, and for this, he has asked the Special Cell to plant dummy bombs to find out how vigilant the district police are, the sources said.

The Delhi Police had conducted a similar exercise in June.

As soon as an IED, a dummy, is detected, the policemen are required to follow regular protocol such as cordon off the area, use sandbags for buttressing and call the bomb disposal team.

On January 14, an unattended bag containing an IED was found at Ghazipur flower market. Officials from the Special Cell, bomb detection and disposal teams from the National Security Guard and fire tenders reached the spot and defused the device.