NEW DELHI: The Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) will provide 24x7 security cover to yoga guru Baba Ramdev's Patanjali Food and Herbal Park, making it the eighth private sector establishment and the only FMCG firm to be protected by the paramilitary force since 2009.
So sparingly is CISF cover extended to private sector establishments that even Mumbai's Taj Hotel, which was attacked on 26/11, was refused security on the ground that hotel industry was not a 'critical' sector and could handle its security through private agencies. More recently, the Saibaba shrine at Shirdi was denied CISF cover, as the home ministry felt this would open a Pandora's box of demands from other religious places.
CISF's other private sector clients are in sectors such as oil, power, steel and IT. They include Reliance's Jamnagar refinery; Infosys campuses in Bengaluru, Mysuru and Pune; Coastal Gujarat Power Ltd at Mundra (Gujarat); Tata Steel at Kalinganagar, Odisha and Electronic City, Bengaluru.
Ramdev's Haridwar-based Patanjali Food and Herbal Park will fully bear the expenses for deployment of 35 CISF personnel on its premises, CISF director general Surender Singh said. As per CISF's mandate, broadened in 2009 in the aftermath of the 26/11 attacks, the force can provide security cover on payment basis to private establishments that contribute immensely to national development. The CISF, sources said, was deployed at the Patanjali facility on "internal security duty" starting June 4, 2015, as per a home ministry order. This was shortly after the firm's management wrote to the ministry requesting CISF protection in view of the "security threats" faced by it. Officials said such immediate deployment is usually done at the highest level of priority, as it allows CISF personnel to be inducted pending home ministry sanction for a survey of the client firm or 'regular' deployment.
The deployment was allegedly based on intelligence inputs of local law and order threats as well as high number of foreign visitors, said a source. Soon after the home ministry cleared the Patanjali file, CISF deployed 33 personnel as quick reaction teams, stationing them at vantage positions to counter a possible terror attack. The monthly bill now is estimated at Rs 21 lakh, but will go up with regular deployment. It was only after the initial "temporary" deployment that CISF got the MHA's sanction for a proper security audit of the facility, followed by approval for regular deployment of 35 CISF personnel from this year.
