SWAT Teams??

[WyoJoe]

Skyn3t's posting on another thread got me to thinking & wondering if the typical police dept in India uses SWAT (Special Weapons and Tactics) teams. Here in the US most departments other than small towns has some kind of SWAT team.

[Hunter]

Sure we Do ! Our cops have lathis!(wodden sticks)to swat people around specially during lathi charges!

[Olly]

They usually SWAT flies the whole day, except for the Special / Crime Branch who are responsible for taking out the hard core criminals...

[cottage cheese]

They usually SWAT flies the whole day, except for the Special / Crime Branch who are responsible for taking out the hard core criminals...

No real organized SWAT or stuff like that... Just too much bureaucratic stumbling blocks to have any long term and well organized units. Besides the man power running into lakhs in the bigger states is still pretty much on the understrength side. (Often new battalions are raised simply as a political expedient to generate employment and thus vote banks)

Most so called 'commando' groups or special operations so and so's are adhoc knee jerk reactions to incidents and situations. Most fizzle out or become frankensteins and liabilities because of wrong criteria for personnel selection(bravado being the foremost quality)...or the motivating officer gets transferred or promoted. All boils down to the system.

As far as police commandos go, most state forces feel wearing a black over-all and a black bandanna with an AK slung on the chest and a Motorola hand set on the belt, and jumping through a fire hoop in training/demos(Awesome brave!) is what constitutes special. No real institutionalized live fire training, mental conditioning, fire and manovures...etc.

[Olly]

Police commandos are just another uniform as u rightly described.... ofcourse with slightly better guns and walkie-talkie sets...
But I associate commandos only with the NSG and SPG. They are the guys who are called into national emergencies. But they are inducted from the Indian armed forces and not the police... Sometimes exceptional candidates make it there from the Central Police Orgnanisations like the BSF, ITBP etc.
The word 'commando', however, doesn't seem to fit any police unit !!

[cottage cheese]

Police commandos are just another uniform as u rightly described.... ofcourse with slightly better guns and walkie-talkie sets...
But I associate commandos only with the NSG and SPG. They are the guys who are called into national emergencies. But they are inducted from the Indian armed forces and not the police... Sometimes exceptional candidates make it there from the Central Police Orgnanisations like the BSF, ITBP etc.
The word 'commando', however, doesn't seem to fit any police unit !!

Well Anupam, I come from a very Police family and I don't have too many nice things to say about it!

One common misconception that is current is that of the SPG. They aren't 'commandos' or 'special forces' in the strict sense. It would be like calling Secret Service agents commandos. The SPG is a very task specific organization- In fact a mini CPO. Their only task is quite obviously protection of the PM and former PMs (If required). No anti terror ops or stuff like that. Likewise their training is also very specific- that of protection and generally defensive oriented. Interestingly, our rather lively political front has produced many ex PMs which has 'dominoed' into a corresponding expansion in the manpower of the SPG...and again a corresponding watering down of standards.

I'd regard the NSG as the closest match that India would have to the SWAT concept...as to how good...well thats a different story!

[Olly]

I had the training concepts in mind when I say SPG. They are of the same breed as the NSG commandos, and given a specific function....