•Ammunition worth Rs 65 crore is needed if a policeman has to fire at least 40 rounds each year. Mumbai Police got only Rs 3 crore each year for the past five years.

•No ammunition for firing practice — the last lot received: 45,000 AK-47 rounds in 2005.

•The team that first entered the Taj Hotel had all of one SLR and one .303.

•Bhagwat Kacharu Bansode, the first police officer to enter the Trident, had one revolver.

And the list goes on and on as the Ram Pradhan Committee is learnt to have detailed the vulnerability of a police force and how it fought the terrorists with its hands tied.

The report is said to underline how Maharashtra Deputy CM Chhagan Bhujbal — in his earlier stint back in 2000 — made it mandatory for every vendor to be approved by the Deputy CM’s office (his office) for any police purchase beyond Rs 25 lakh. This even after all regular sanctions were received.

Result: Bottlenecks, delays, no upgradation of equipment and ammunition.

It’s learnt that the committee has pointed to the specific instance of Sadanand Date, Additional Commissioner of Mumbai’s Central region, whose pistol did not work when he and his team confronted the terrorists at Cama Hospital.

The terrorists escaped, killing members of Date’s team besides injuring him. Date is said to have escaped because the terrorists probably thought he was dead.

The Director General of Police is said to have told the Committee that there was no ammunition for firing practice and that the last lot he received was 45000 AK-47 rounds in 2005.

... contd.