Amid BSF row, Ajit Doval pitches for bigger police role in border management

New Delhi, November 12

National Security Adviser Ajit Doval today stressed the need for a larger role for the police in protecting India’s land boundary and coastlines, besides maintaining law and order across the country.

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Speaking at the passing-out parade of IPS probationers at the Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel National Police Academy in Hyderabad, Doval said police forces had a greater role in the management of border spanning over 15,000 km covering Pakistan, China, Myanmar and Bangladesh where India had security-related issues.

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15,000-km stretch

Not only policing, you (IPS officers) will be responsible for border management... The 15,000-km border has peculiar problems. Ajit Doval, NSA

The National Security Adviser noted India’s sovereignty stretched as far as the last police station’s jurisdiction from the coastal areas to the border areas. Incidentally, his comments came a day after the Punjab Assembly adopted a resolution opposing the Centre’s notification that extended the jurisdiction of the Border Security Force (BSF), calling it an “insult” to the state police and seeking its withdrawal.

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The Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) had last month amended the BSF Act and issued a notification authorising the border guarding force to undertake search, seizure and arrest within a 50-km stretch, up from the existing 15 km, from the international border in Punjab, West Bengal and Assam. “It’s not just policing about which you (IPS officers) have been trained, but you will be responsible for border management… (we have) 15,000-km border stretch, most parts of which have peculiar problems,” the NSA said. Noting that wars had ceased to become an effective instrument, Doval said it was the civil society that could be subverted, divided and manipulated “to hurt the interests of the nation”.

“This has now become a new war frontier. If internal security fails, no country can be great. If people are not safe, they cannot rise to the potential and probably the country will never grow,” he said. — TNS