In 2010, some 1,003 people including law enforcement officials lost their lives fighting against or as victims of 'left-wing' insurgency. This figure was 908 in 2009 and 721 in the year 2008. In 2009, there were 55 affected districts which got assistance (partly estimated at Rs 2,475 crore). In 2010, the number of districts had gone up to 83. The Government has been accused of not spending enough on fighting this form of insurgency. While that might be true, Government expenditure on policing this problem has been increasing steadily as SPR's Sourjya Bhowmick finds out. The question then might be whether it is sufficient or the right kind.

A month ago, India’s Home Minister P Chidambaram, reportedly said that there were 500,000 vacancies in the state police forces, as a whole.

The total number of Indian Police Service (IPS) officers or the administrative cadre is supposed to be 4,720 but there are only 3,393 officers now. It would take 7 years to reach an 'optimum' level. He also said funds were big constraint in improving the policing system. The Home Minister also said that the state governments are not spending enough on policing. In fact, all the states clubbed together spend less than the centre. SPR Foundation recently went through the Annual Report, Union Budget and the Supplementary Demand for Grants of the Home Ministry. In addition to various committees, task forces, an Inter Ministerial Group and a separate department of Naxal Management, Ministry of Home Affairs to look at spending to curb 'left-wing' insurgency (mostly Naxalite movements).

Now, we've compiled various categories under which the Government has been spending to curb Insurgency, according to the Annual Report. We would caution that these figures may have missed out some smaller sub-heads under the law and order expenditure category, against anti-insurgency for India as a whole. A detailed report looking at state wise expenditure and also comparing total spend with previous years will shortly appear.

Govt Expenditure On Fighting Insurgency 2010

Note: The total number of Special Police Officers (meant to strengthen police intelligence) is 12,000. Also, being an informer is a risky job as Naxalites are mostly known to kill them. However, their honorarium is only Rs 3000 per month. The Government continued to provide more funds after the Union Budget 2011-12. The first set of Supplementary Demand for Grants for 2011-2012, released in August 2011 released additional funds. Some of these funds might be allocated to non-insurgency related expenditure though they all fall under expenditure on policing.

Money Allotted To Fight Insurgency 2011

Total Estimates For the year so far: Rs 5,031 crore.

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