Like the brave and valorous personnel of three armed forces—army, navy and air force— our police and paramilitary forces also have made great sacrifices of valuable lives in defending the country against internal subversion and external incursion for last six decades. Yet despite their supreme sacrifice, the personnel of the police and paramilitaries are not given the tag of ‘martyr’ when they fall fighting the terrorists, Naxalites, Maoists and other anti-national elements. Why is this discrimination made, remains a mystery. The paramilitary forces which account for a strong posse of over 9 lakh personnel are under the control of the Home Ministry. More prominent among these are CRPF, BSF, ITBP, SSB, CISF and RPF. They are deployed in difficult terrains and unfriendly climatic conditions. The militants, terrorists and rebels make them their target. But except for pensions and medal, they are not placed at par with the three armed wings of our defence forces. A spokesman of their union very rightly said that giving the tag is not for giving them any special monetary benefit. It is essentially to give them due respect they deserve as the first line of defence of the country facing the brunt of enemy’s fire and wrath. Notably since 1961, the number of police and paramilitary personnel killed in action is 31,895. During this year (September 2012-August 2013), 579 personnel throughout the country laid down their lives during duty. The figures clearly show that the paramilitaries are called upon to make the supreme sacrifice of their life while defending the interests and security of the country.
We do not think that the sacrifices made by the police and paramilitaries are in any way inferior or less significant than the sacrifices made by our armed forces. It has also to be noted that external threat and internal subversion in the country have not abated in recent years rather these have increased manifold. In view of escalation of border tension and widespread terrorist network in the country, our police and paramilitaries will be called upon to perform critical duty in near future. We will need to raise more battalions of paramilitaries because the overall security scenario in the country is not that satisfactory as we would desire it to be. It, therefore, becomes evident that we shall have to give due consideration and regard and importance to our armed forces and paramilitaries.
It is pertinent to mention that the police and paramilitaries have reiterated their long standing demand for the ‘martyr’ tag to the fallen heroes in the annual meet of the organizations on October 21. It is regrettable to note that in the true sense of the idiom of passing the buck, the files pertaining to the issue are being transited from one office to another with no particular desk desirous of taking a decision in national interests. We cannot accept any excuse of the case needing to pass through a plethora of procedures before it is finalized. It is only a demoralizing tactics and should be avoided. Let the authorities take the initiative and decide the case once for all instead of letting it hang fire for years at end. We would appeal to the concerned authorities at the level of MHA or the Defence Ministry etc. not to do anything that would demoralize our security forces and personnel. They have immense burden of responsibilities on their shoulder. Please help them to carry the burden of responsibilities.
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