NEW DELHI, Jan 12: The Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s security — the highest in the country — was breached on Thursday during his roadshow in Hubbali in Karnataka by a teen who jumped onto the road suddenly and managed to get within an arm’s length of him. He was intercepted at the last minute and whisked away by the Special Protection Group (SPG) of the Prime Minister.
The teen was carrying a garland and apparently trying to felicitate the Prime Minister, who was riding on the running board of an SUV and waving to cheering crowds. While the SPG men immediately blocked him, the Prime Minister was seen accepting the garland and handing it to a security official.
A video clip from the roadshow showed a boy running towards the Prime Minister with a garland. “All people in the enclosure, from where that boy came, were properly frisked by SPG and the whole area was properly sanitised by security agencies. It is not a serious lapse,” official sources insisted.
The prime minister’s roadshow was taken out just before he inaugurated the National Youth Festival and he was accorded a warm welcome by enthusiastic people who lined up on both sides of the road. Standing on the ‘running board’ of his moving car, Modi waved at the crowd, many of whom were seen chanting ‘Modi, Modi’ and ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’ slogans. At some places, people showered flower petals as his cavalcade passed through the stretch slowly.
It is not yet known how the boy, who seemed to be around 15 years old, managed to get so close to the Prime Minister in an area that is expected to be thoroughly sanitized. While hundreds of slogan-shouting supporters lined the road from the airport, they were well behind the barricades. The Prime Minister has a five-layer security, of which the outermost layer is the responsibility of the state police.
PM Modi’s security was breached last year during his visit to Punjab. While on his way to Ferozepur for an election rally on January 5, the Prime Minister’s cavalcade was stopped for 20 minutes on a flyover in full view of television cameras due to a blockade by protesting farmers. A committee probing the security breach found lapses on part of the Punjab police, the Supreme Court had said. The five-member committee, led by former Supreme Court judge Justice Indu Malhotra, later suggested remedial measures to strengthen the Prime Minister’s security.
The top court, which had formed the committee to determine if there was any criminal conspiracy in the security breach, had said the report would be sent to the Centre “so that necessary steps can be taken.”
(Manas Dasgupta)
