BHUBANESWAR: Puri district administration has asked all licensed gun owners to deposit their firearms with the police ahead of Pipili by-election scheduled on April 17.
There are about 150 licensed arms holders in Pipili assembly segment and about 30 per cent of them have so far deposited their weapons with the police.
Director General of Police (DGP) Abhay has directed officials to intensify prophylactic measures like bounding down of habitual offenders under Sections 107 and 110 of CrPC, seize illegal arms and illicit liquor and execute non-bailable warrants to ensure free, fair, transparent, impartial and incident-free by-poll.
The police have already booked 504 persons under Section 107 CrPC, 25 habitual offenders under 110 CrPC and have executed/disposed of 73 non-bailable warrants. Police are also conducting raids at various areas in Pipili to check the sale of illicit liquor.
During a review meeting of the security arrangements via video conferencing on Wednesday, the DGP stressed on strict enforcement of model code of conduct and adherence to Election Commission of India's guidelines and Covid-19 protocols for police and security arrangements including visits of VIPs and VVIPs.
ADG (Law and Order) YK Jethwa, Intelligence Director Radha Kishan Sharma, DIG Central Range Jai Narayan Pankaj and Puri SP Kanwar Vishal Singh were present.
Jethwa reviewed the overall deployment plan and instructed to enhance patrolling by engaging mobile squads and flying squads and to conduct thorough checking by setting up nakas (check points) around Pipili constituency.
Sharma shared the intelligence related to the by-election and urged the DIG and SP to closely monitor the law and order situation.
Security arrangements for VIPs and VVIPs scheduled to visit Pipili for campaigning, strict and prompt action for election-related cases, mapping of critical and vulnerable booths and implementing steps accordingly were discussed in the meeting.
At least 15 platoons of Odisha Police and one company of Central Armed Police Forces (CAPF) will be deployed to ensure smooth and incident-free by-poll.