When mob violence erupted in Howrah's Panchla area on Monday, personnel of the Rapid Action Force were rushed in to control the situation. But the Central Reserve Police Force brass here — RAF battalions are part of this Central paramilitary force — had no clue.

Senior officers, who came to know of the RAF being deployed through media reports, took a while to figure out what was happening. Though the nomenclature and uniform were the same, the Force in question was the Kolkata Police's Rapid Action Force (RAF) and not the Central force.

A worried CRPF had approached the Union Home Ministry, asking it to rein in states that have created their own Rapid Action Forces or provided uniforms similar to those worn by CRPF's RAF personnel. The Force had written to the Ministry barely a month ago. Senior CRPF officers are learnt to have taken up the matter with the Ministry again after Monday's incident, official sources said.

In a letter to the Ministry last month, a senior CRPF official had drawn its attention to the specialised armed police battalion of the Kolkata Armed Police, saying it was not only using the name RAF but its personnel were also wearing the same blue uniform with the RAF insignia.

This was against a Home Ministry directive issued to all state governments in 1997, asking them not to use RAF as a prefix or suffix. The states were asked not to provide uniforms similar to those used by the RAF. The Ministry was requested to intervene and advise the West Bengal Government against this practice to “avoid any mistaken identity leading to complications”.

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