Of late country’s security organization has been raising the question of regulating private security personnel engaged by various organizations and individuals in the light of anti-national elements raising their ugly face. As of today, there is proliferation of private security agencies in the State who recruit private guards to be engaged by private organizations. So far this was free for everybody and then the private agencies mushroomed. But this has posed a threat to the security of the State. As such the Government was obliged to approve legal framework to maintain close supervision of the private security agencies in view of the security related sensitivity of the State. It has been found that sometimes men of these agencies move about in uniforms like those of policemen and also carry arms. Naturally this creates bizarre situation and the private security men can be mistaken as regular police force. Police force feels that this is encroachment on their area of concern and should be curbed. Actually, it is the Home Ministry that had drawn the attention of the State Government towards this phenomenon and had strongly recommended bringing in legislation to regularize private securities. Feeling the urgency of the matter and also the instruction from the Home Ministry, the State Government has decided to bring in an ordinance. Private Security Agencies (Regulation) Act, passed by the Parliament in 2005, is not applicable to the State of Jammu and Kashmir. And as the Assembly is not in session, bringing in ordinance is the only way to deal with this issue. The Draft J&K Private Security Agencies Bill had already been tabled in the Assembly but owing to opposition from some members it was sent to Select Committee where it ultimately lapsed. Thus comes in the ordinance. Now Draft J&K Private Security Agencies (Regulation) Ordinance, 2015, which has already been vetted by the Law Department, has received Cabinet’s approval for submission to the Governor. This, we think, is the right step because of various complications that impinge upon the security of the State have cropped up owing to these private security agencies. Maybe the Government has specific instances of infringement of security system on account of non-regularization and registration and licensing of the approved private security agencies. This might have necessitated bringing in the ordinance.
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