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| CRPF director general K Vijay Kumar inspects the barrack in Sembo on Wednesday. Picture by Prashant Mitra |
Ranchi, Aug.3: CRPF director general K. Vijay Kumar today inaugurated a group centre at Sembo, about 25 km from the district headquarters in Dhurwa police station area.
Spread over a 91 acre area, the group centre, which will be home to 120 jawans and 20 officers to start with, is surrounded by hillocks. Once completed, as many as 1600 CRPF jawans can stay in the facility with their families. For them, five pucca barracks and adequate number of family quarters will be constructed.
CRPF deputy inspector general S.K.Upadhayay said the centre would provide logistical support to as many as 6,000 CRPF jawans associated with five battalions. The 81 battalion at Ambikapur in Chhastisgarh, 94 battalion at Khunti, 114 battalion at Jalandhar in Punjab, 118 battalion at Anantnag in Kashmir and 159 battalion at Gaya in Bihar will stand to benefit.
“By logistical support we mean everything from the process of recruitment to providing pension to retired personnel of five battalions will be done from here. It will be the duty of this centre to address all requirements of jawans of the five battalions. Facilities like uniforms, allowances, salary and vehicles, besides arms and ammunition would be taken care of from here,” he said, adding that the earlier group centre was located at Sindri, in the residential colony of Fertiliser Corporation of India Limited.
He said the centre would also help CRPF jawans deputed in the state. “As many as 15 battalions of CRPF, including Cobra, is deputed in Jharkhand. The centre will also help provide training to jawans in future,” he said.
He said though the centre would get power supply from JSEB now, it would soon have access to solar energy. A helipad features in future plans.
Two more group centres will be opened in the near future in Bokaro and Jamshedpur.
“The state government has pledged basic amenities to the CRPF in various districts as per the Union ministry of home affairs guidelines and work is going on in that direction,” the officer said.
“Local youths have been asked to start vegetable cultivation and dairies to fulfil the requirements of the centre. Once the centre is fully operational, more job opportunities will be generated,” Upadhyay said.
Earlier, the CRPF director general expressed his full satisfaction over the operations going on in the state against Maoists and said such operations will continue in future.
“I spoke to the state director general of police yesterday. He said everything was steady. Our operations against Maoists have been successful in the state,” he said.