Director General of Police Arvind Inamdar recently held two meetings with top police officers including Mumbai Police Commissioner Ronald Mendonca, Thane Commissioner Bhujangrao Mohite, Navi Mumbai Commissioner Sudhakar Ambedkar, Inspector General of Police (Thane) Ranjit Singh Sharma and Superintendent of Police (Thane rural) Ashok Kamte to finalise finer details of the arrangement. This followed a hint given by Deputy Chief Minister Gopinath Munde, who also holds the home portfolio, at a meeting recently about the formation of a ``common board'' that would include senior police officers of Mumbai, Thane and New Mumbai.

The easyaccessibility of Thane and Navi Mumbai from Mumbai has turned these regions into safe havens for criminals. Also, gangsters operating in Thane and Navi Mumbai to seek refuge in Mumbai when pressure from police increases. Mumbai police's jurisdiction ends at Mulund or Dahisar on the western side or Mankhurd on the east. Criminals often take advantage of this by flitting across Mumbai's border with Navi Mumbai or Thane making it impossible for police to pursue them.

To arrest a criminal who has crossed into Navi Mumbai, Mumbai police would need formal permission from their counterparts there. And even if the permission was obtained, looking for a criminal in an alien territory is a tough task.

All this is likely to change now. The Inspector general (Thane range) R S Sharma said: ``Although there never was restriction on police to raid a place beyond their jurisdiction, in the two meetings held so far, the need for timely and closer coordination has been stressed.'' The first step towards establishing thiswas taken last Wednesday after the second meeting at the state police headquarters. ``It was decided that the deputy commissioner of police (crime) of each commissionerate will act as the nodal officer to interact with his counterparts in other areas,'' Joint Commissioner of Police (crime) D Sivanandhan said. While DCP (detection) of Mumbai crime branch, Param Bir Singh will carry out this task in Mumbai, in Thane DCP Ashok Devre of Thane crime will be responsible for coordinating with other areas. Since Navi Mumbai does not have a DCP (crime), Commissioner Sudhakar Ambedkar has assigned the task to Senior Police Inspector (crime branch) P L Sandashiv.

``Geographical demarcation are for administrative reasons but it is not applicable to the criminals. Even earlier, we kept in touch over the phone and wireless but now constant coordination will help each other tremendously,'' Ambedkar said.

The results, in fact, are already showing. Krishna Ghagh, a top lieutenant of the Suresh Manchekar gang and one ofthe ten most wanted criminals in Thane, was arrested in Mumbai by unit-VI of the crime branch recently. This was preceded by the arrest of five Abu Salem gang members wanted in connection with a double murder at Vasai. The case was being handled by the Manikpur police station. Last week, the Ram Nagar police station in Dombivli gunned down a top sharpshooter from the Ashwin Naik gang, Kasturi Anna at Dombivli. Anna was wanted in over 14 cases of extortion, assault and murder by the Mumbai police.