Telangana DGP unveils 100-member squad against food adulteration

According to an Eenadu report, the new unit would work alongside a revamped drug control and food inspection framework.

Hyderabad: Telangana Police will form a 100-member enforcement wing dedicated to cracking down on food adulteration, Director General of Police (DGP) CV Anand said, as he marked 100 days in the state’s top police post.

According to an Eenadu report, the new unit would work alongside a revamped drug control and food inspection framework, and that a system named “T Safe” would soon go live to widen inspections and boost laboratory capacity for testing samples. He linked the push to a rise in cancer cases in the state, saying the chief minister was determined to rein in adulteration.

The DGP also flagged rising cannabis use and drug-related crime, including in rural areas, and said gangs peddling narcotics were growing bolder in cities as well. He cited Punjab, where he said murders were being committed for as little as Rs 2,000-3,000 under the influence of drugs, and said Telangana would not let the situation reach that point. He pointed to the “H-New” wing he had set up as Hyderabad Police Commissioner, and said its successor, TGANB, now renamed Eagle, had delivered good results against narcotics.

Cybercrime in Telangana

On cybercrime, Anand said victims in Telangana lost about Rs 1,750 crore to online fraud last year, against roughly Rs 250 crore lost to other forms of robbery and theft combined. He urged people to be wary of investment schemes promising unusually high or doubling returns, and said “cyber warriors” posted at police stations were being used to spread awareness.

Anand said the department was drafting a new Telangana Police Manual and reworking its policing strategy for the next 15 years, with priorities including narcotics, cybercrime, food adulteration and traffic. He said the force was also using AI-based analytics, through a unit called “T-Spark,” to track sentiment among young people on social media following recent unrest, including protests at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar, and would report findings to the state government.

Out of the department’s roughly 93,000 personnel, he said some were being pulled back from the Greyhounds and Octopus units to strengthen these areas, and that the government also wants to strengthen the Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) and Vigilance wing.

Traffic in Hyderabad

On traffic, he said close to 9.5 million vehicles now ply the four Hyderabad commissionerates, with about 1,500 new vehicles registered daily, and that congestion was worsening in towns such as Warangal, Karimnagar and Nizamabad too. A Traffic Management and Road Safety bureau, to be called T-MARS, is set to launch soon, staffed partly by 300 personnel redeployed from the Greyhounds and Octopus units.

Responding to criticism over reduced security cover for politicians, Anand said the state had withdrawn 400 personnel and 20 bullet-proof vehicles from VIP protection duties, noting he had given up his own bullet-proof car, and defended the move given the decline in Maoist activity nationally.

On corruption complaints against IPS officers, he acknowledged a rise in allegations compared with earlier years and said he was counselling officers individually, warning that stricter action would follow if conduct did not improve.