The UP Police HQ, Rs 60 crore has been proposed for new forensic labs. (File photo)
The government Tuesday set aside separate funds in its 2020-21 annual Budget for the infrastructural development of the police department, including construction of buildings, forensic labs and police modernisation. The Budget has a provision of Rs 650 crore for construction of non-residential and Rs 600 crore for residential buildings of police department, Finance Minister Suresh Kumar Khanna said in his budget speech. In addition, Rs 300 crore has been proposed for the construction of residential and non-residential buildings in newly created districts, he said.
The Budget has earmarked Rs 150 crore for construction of residential and non-residential buildings of fire fighting stations, and Rs 122 crore under the police modernisation scheme. A sum of Rs 60 crore has been proposed for construction of forensic labs, while a provision of Rs 97 crore has been made under the Safe City Lucknow scheme, besides sanctioning Rs 20 crore for setting up the UP Police Forensic University.
Highlighting the announcement for setting up a police forensic university in Lucknow, CM Yogi Adityanath said that police modernisation is necessary with changing nature of crimes. He also said that for women safety, several measures have been taken in the Budget, including facilitating drop for women working in night shifts through police response vehicles and Mukhya Mantri Kanya Sumangla Yojna.
For the employees of the police department, the budget has a provision of Rs 27 crore for ex-gratia payment to the families of police and fire fighting employees, who are martyred or sustain injury during the discharge of their duty.
While Rs 10 crore has been allocated to strengthen fire fighting services, Rs 20 crore has been granted to set up solar power plants to strengthen power arrangements.
The Budget also has provision of Rs 28 crore for financial assistance under the Central Victim Compensation Fund scheme in the cases of acid attack, rape, human trafficking or murder.
An amount of Rs 14 crore has been sanctioned under the Student Police Cadet scheme and Rs 3 crore for Cyber Crime Prevention, the minister added.
With PTI inputs