Gujarat Police and the state Home Department are preparing to set up a White Collar Crime Wing, the first in the country, for investigating serious economic offences in the state.

The body, to be based at Gandhinagar, will be fully operational in a few months, said Director General of Police, S S Khandwawala

Khandwawala told Newsline: “A dedicated wing can do specialized investigations. This would greatly increase the pace of the white collar crime investigations. The wing having a specialized staff will work independently under the department.”

Unlike other major cities like Mumbai, Delhi, and Chennai that have Economic Offences Wings attached with the Crime Branch, CID and other agencies, the Gujarat Police have only one EOW under its CID Crime branch. Other agencies like the Detection of Crime Branch in cities and Local Crime Branch in rural areas often accord only second priority to white collar crime cases, after investigations of other serious crimes.

According to Gujarat Police, the wing will also reduce burden of the CID. Moreover, the police have already started reviewing agencies that were investigating the cases

until now to see the rates of the pendency of investigations and to understand the problems leading to delay in probing white collar crimes.

Khandwawala said, “If needed, the EOW would be detached from CID. We want to effectively reach the districts where there is no EOW. The wing would have a pan-Gujarat reach and every case irrespective of city or village would be investigated on time. As for pendency of cases, we are going to start a review exercise.”

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