Panaji, March 6 (IANS): Goa Police personnel should be sent to Nigeria for toughening up, a ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislator said Thursday.

Referring to the riots in October 2013, when an angry mob of Nigerians beat up policemen in public, legislator Vishnu Wagh said the "weak" Goa Police personnel should be made to walk the streets of Nigeria to "toughen up".

"Please send our policemen to Nigeria. Let them get whacked and come back. They will come out tougher after that experience," Wagh told the assembly, which was discussing the governor's address during the budget session.

Over 50 Nigerians, protesting the murder of a compatriot by a local drug gang, were arrested after they blocked a highway near Panaji in October. Before their arrest, the Nigerians beat up policemen, who were mute spectators to the highway blockade.

Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar, who is also the home minister and in charge of the police department, also criticised the police in the assembly.

"Police officials are afraid of taking on mining cases," Parrikar said, referring to the mining mafia.