BSF to train border population for employment

Aiming at closer involvement of the population residing along the border with the country's mainstream, the Border Security Force (BSF) has initiated a vocational training programme which will generate employment for them in private sector.

 

The border guarding force, which is deployed along the frontiers of Pakistan and Bangladesh, has partnered with the National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) to train and subsequently create job opportunities both for the border population and families of the force personnel, in partnership with corporates.

 

Union Home Ministry and Jammu and Kashmir government are already running a similar programme aimed at providing jobs to 40,000 Kashmiri youth over five years.

 

"The initiative is aimed at bringing the border population into the national mainstream and the thinking is that once the people engaged in criminal activities get employment, the cross-border crime will reduce automatically," BSF Deputy Inspector General and nodal officer of the initiative Vijay Sakhare told reporters.

 

The force will earn the goodwill and confidence of locals which goes a long way in ensuring security at the borders, he added. 

 

The first pilot project of the employment-linked vocational training programme was inaugurated by Shefali Bansal, wife of BSF chief U K Bansal, here on Friday. She is the president of the BSF Wives Welfare Association which is sponsoring the initiative through a loan-based mechanism.

 

While 50 women will be trained under the new scheme in the national capital, 140 others would be imparted vocational skills at Shillong and Tura in Meghalaya in the first phase. "At the end of vocational training, students would be given jobs by the corporate partners of the NSDC and families would be provided with self-employment opportunities on a sustainable basis so that they can supplement their incomes," the DIG said.

 

Border Security Force (BSF) proposes to extend this programme to its countrywide formations including in Jammu and Kashmir, Rajasthan and Gujarat. The force will bear all the expenses of the training.