Paramilitary forces expand their role in combating coronavirus

Vijay Mohan

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, March 13

The Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) under the Ministry of Home Affairs are expanding their role in combating the coronavirus outbreak by setting up additional quarantine centres at their training establishments.

“ITBP headquarters have issued orders for preparing quarantine centres at our four establishments which train recruits, where about 1,300 people can be accommodated,” an Indo-Tibetan Border Police Force (ITBP) officer said.

These include the basic training centre at Bhanu in Haryana and recruit training centres at Karera in Madhya Pradesh, Kimin in Arunachal Pradesh and Shivgangai in Tamil Nadu. “Directions have been issued to the centre commanders to take up engineering, sanitation and hygiene matters on priority,” he added.

So far, the ITBP has set up a centre at Chhawla village in New Delhi for screening and quarantining travellers retiring from certain foreign countries for Covid-19. Inmates who have stayed at this centre include foreign nationals. The Army has also set up such centres at Manesar and Jaisalmer.

Last week, the Ministry of Home Affairs also issued instructions for uniformed personnel and medical teams deployed on United Nations (UN) field missions to foreign countries on measures to be taken for mitigating the spread of Covid-19.

Earlier, the UN had written to the Permanent Mission of India to the United Nations, listing out additional training as well as medical equipment required immediately for overseas deployment.

Training for service and medical personnel will be both, prior to deployment which would be the responsible of the contributing country, as well as in-mission training during deployment. This includes certain mandatory online courses recommended by the UN.

All military and police medical teams deployed with the UN are required to develop standard operating procedures to identify, triage and manage suspected Covid-19 and establish isolation rooms in their respective facilities. All CAPFs are regularly contributing personnel to UN missions as peacekeepers or observers.