Many BSF jawans extend support to Yadav on food quality

Rachna Khaira

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, January 10

Even though the Border Security Force (BSF) has tried to hide its embarrassment caused by its jawan Tej Bahadur Yadav over the food quality issue by declaring him an insane and alcoholic man, the “daring cop”, who is due to retire on January 31 this year, has begun to garner “silent support” from his fellow men across the nation.

A Tribune team, during its visit to an ORs mess inside the Punjab Frontier’s headquarters in Jalandhar late Tuesday evening, though found everything in place, with jawans being served dal makhni, aaloo gobi and kheer, with lots of dry fruits sprinkled over it, the scene in the adjoining mess was found to be quite different.

Sarson ka saag, cut unevenly, along with Lauki ki sabzi was being served to the jawans. “Unlike the Army, we get ration money of Rs 2,905 per month and pay for our meals. Though the food served is fairly good, there is a need to increase the ration money amount,” said one of the constables posted at a forward post at Tangdhar in Jammu and Kashmir.

Jalandhar Frontier, along with the Indian Army, is presently safeguarding the entire International Border adjoining Pakistan in Punjab. Due to this, a majority of the jawans met during the interaction were found to be deployed on the border.

Though initially everyone swore by the “excellent” quality of food being served at the borders, when asked to comment on the “insane” video posted by Yadav on social media, no one spoke against Yadav.

Though the jawans looked hesitant to speak freely in the presence of senior officials present in the mess, the support for Yadav and anguish against the quality of food could be seen in their eyes.

The condition of cooks too was found to be a little worrisome. Around two to three cooks were found to be deployed in each mess. Though little help is being provided to them by deploying more jawans, there is no extra stipend given to these cooks who are given the cumbersome task of preparing three full meals for around 150 jawans everyday. Even in units deployed at the borders, only two to three cooks generally prepare food for around 1,200 jawans.

Though senior BSF officials at the Punjab Frontiers Head Quarter refused to officially comment on the Yadav incident, they, however, raised suspicion over his intention by saying that even dogs adjoining the BSF camps were found to be healthy.

“We cook so much food that even dogs living near our camp areas do get healthy. It appears that Yadav must have done it intentionally to cause damage to the BSF’s reputation for settling some personal score,” said a senior official.

While the Ministry of Home Affairs has ordered an enquiry into the incident to bring out the fact, sources said that the incident had sent a warning signal to the armed forces and paramilitary forces who have made “dramatic” changes in the menus of their respective messes from Tuesday.