In a rare event, a senior officer of the Border Security Force (BSF) has been appointed as the head of its Tekanpur-based academy, the alma mater of the officers of the country's largest frontier-guarding force.
On June 1, 1983-batch BSF-cadre officer S S Chahar took over the charge of the academy's director -- an Additional Director General (ADG) rank -- a senior official said.
Chahar is the 13th officer of the cadre to have been elevated to the second top post in the organisation, after the DG, in its history of over 50 years.
He has served on both the western and eastern frontiers of the country, where the BSF guards the important Indian borders with Pakistan and Bangladesh respectively.
Chahar, a decorated officer with honours like the Vishisht Seva Medal (VSM) and police medals for meritorious and distinguished services under his belt, will be at the helm of the academy till 2021, the senior BSF official said.
Chahar hails from Agra and is a gold medallist in M.Sc physics.
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Established in 1966, the BSF academy is located in Tekanpur in Madhya Pradesh, near Gwalior. It is also home to institutes of national importance like the tear smoke unit (the only factory in the country to produce tear smoke shells and similar ammunition) and the national training centre for dogs.
The ADG rank is very rarely occupied by a BSF officer as only one post is reserved for them and the rest four are taken by Indian Police Service (IPS) officers, who join the central force on deputation.
The academy trains BSF officers who come to it after clearing the UPSC exam and after graduating from it, they are posted as assistant commandants.
The BSF has a strength of about 2.5 lakh personnel and apart from rendering its primary task of guarding the Pakistan and Bangladesh borders, it also conducts anti-Naxal operations and assists the state police units in undertaking law-and-order and counter-insurgency duties.