Central Police Canteen

The Canteen Stores Department (CSD) under the Ministry of Defence provides its facilities primarily to the personnel of Indian military and the Ministry of Home Affairs had proposed to expand its scope to include the members of different Central Armed Police Forces during the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Government. Though the proposal was acceptable to the Prime Minister, it was opposed and rejected by the Ministry of Defence. It was in the year 2006 when the-then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh agreed with and acted upon a proposal to establish a new retail chain scheme for the personnel of CAPFs similar to the CSD.[1] The Kendriya Police Kalyan Bhandar system was inaugurated on 26 September 2006 under the Ministry of Home Affairs.[2]

The Central Police Canteen comes under the control of the Ministry of Home Affairs and works as an independent department. It is governed by the Central Administrative Committee (CAC) headed by an additional director general-rank officer and includes six inspectors general from six different CAPFs. The primary objective of the CAC is to prepare and implement the standard operating procedures related to the functioning of the Kendriya Police Kalyan Bhandar system and it also works as a monitoring agency of the whole system. The Central Purchase Committee of the system is headed by an inspector general and includes five members of the rank deputy inspector general.[3] The purchase committee negotiates prices of the items retailed at CPCs with the different firms.[3] The heads of both the committees are appointed by the ministry on the rotation basis from among the different CAPFs. Each committee is constituted for a period of two years with members coming from different CAPFs nominated by their respective directors general. An officer of the rank of deputy inspector general discharges the role of chief executive officer to handle the routine affairs of the system and heads the headquarters, known as the Central Office, situated at Rama Krishna Puram, New Delhi. There are total 119 master canteens directly under the Central Office and 1,778 subsidiary canteens throughout the country are at the end of the CPC system hierarchy which deal with customers.[4][5]

Subsidiary canteen at the Kerala Police Armed Reserve Police Camp, Kollam

After its inception in 2006, the Central Police Canteen provided its services only to the serving and retired personnel of the different CAPFs and their family members. However, different police organisations in the country approached the Ministry of Home Affairs ever so often to extend the facility of the CPC to include their personnel as well. Keeping such requests under consideration, the Ministry promulgated an order on 18 October 2011 to enlarge the scope of beneficiaries of the CPC facility to include serving and retired members of the various Central Police Organisations including the Intelligence Bureau, the Bureau of Police Research and Development, the National Crime Records Bureau and the National Investigation Agency, the Special Protection Group, the National Disaster Response Force and the Central Bureau of Investigation, different states police forces and the employees of the Home Ministry with service not less than five years.[6]

The products sold at the subsidiary canteens of the Central Police Canteen do not get special tax exemption as it is provided to the same products available at the Canteen Stores Department. It makes the products available at the CPC costlier in comparison to the CSD. Many organisations including different CAPFs, different states police forces and the Confederation of Ex-Paramilitary Forces Welfare Association have petitioned the Central Government from time to time to provide Goods and Services Tax exemption for the products available at the CPC in lines with the CSD.[7][8] However, the Home Ministry refused to provide such rebate in October 2019 and decided to instead "compensate the CPCs through budgetary support to that extent".[9]

Prime Minister Narendra Modi addressed the nation on 12 May 2020 to announce a special economic package among other measures taken by the government during the coronavirus pandemic. He underscored the importance of indigenous products and local supply chain and appealed to the nation to "be vocal for [country's] local products [and] not just buy but also publicise them".[10] Next day after the appeal of the Prime Minister, the Union Home Minister Amit Shah made an announcement that the Central Police Canteens throughout the country would only sell either Indian products or made in Indian products and this order was supposed to come into effect from 1 June 2020.[11] Proceeding on with the direction of the Ministry of Home Affairs, the Chief Executive Officer of the CPC CRPF DIG R. K. Meena issued a list of 1,026 items on 29 May which he found non-indigenous and were required to be banned for sale in the CPC subsidiary canteens. The list created a controversy as many products of Indian companies and products manufactured in India by the foreign companies featured in it. The Ministry withdrew the order issued by Meena on 1 June stating that he prepared and issued the list without taking the approval from the competent authority.[12] The Kendriya Police Kalyan Bhandar issued an order on 2 June to recall the order issued on 29 May "with immediate effect" and that it would "re-scrutinise the lists of products under different categories".[13] Meena was removed from his post of the CEO and repatriated to the CRPF on 3 June and another CRPF DIG Rajeev Ranjan Kumar was appointed as his replacement.[12]