Paramilitary forces have 60,000 vacancies to fill

The central paramilitary forces have around 60,000 vacancies to fill, with Border Security Force (BSF) topping the list with 43 per cent of them.

The Union Home Ministry has said it is normal, and there is no need to panic, as such vacancies arise due to retirement, resignation and new raisings—a “routine ongoing administrative process”. As on January 31, the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), BSF, Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) and Assam Rifles together have 59,394 vacancies, including 7,081 for women personnel.

Interestingly, none of these forces have any vacancy in the category of women gazetted officers. According to the latest statistics, the BSF has the highest number of vacancies of 25,749, among which 186 are for gazetted officers, 1,014 for subordinate officers, and 4,876 for women personnel.

The BSF, which guards the Indo-Pak and Indo-Bangladesh borders, has over 2.4 lakh personnel. The CRPF, the main anti-Maoist force with a strength of over 3.1 lakh, has 16,710 vacancies, while the 1.20-lakh-strong CISF has 5,737 vacancies.
The ITBP, which guards the Indo-China border, has 3,213 vacancies out of a total strength of over 80,000.

“Timely action is taken to fill up the vacancies. They remain unfilled due to a lot of reasons, including non-joining of candidates selected for a post,” said a senior official.
Another worry for the security establishment is the number of requests for voluntary retirement and resignation. This year so far, 306 personnel took VRS, while 118 put in papers. The figures for 2014 were 5,834 and 1,971, respectively.

The figures showed that for the past three years, voluntary retirement numbers have dropped almost 40 per cent, while the number of resignations has not recorded a high reduction. In 2012, 10,835 people opted for voluntary retirement, which fell to 9,836 in 2013 and 5,834 in 2014. Resignations dropped to 1,971 in 2014 from 2,169 in 2012 and 2,292 in 2013.

The official said there is a decline in the number of gazetted officers who have opted to quit the forces in 2014 as compared to 2012.