Amid COVID surge, security forces witness 5-fold jump in cases in last 10 days

By Ankur Sharma
New Delhi [India], April 16 (ANI): Paramilitary forces have almost witnessed five-fold increase in active COVID-19 cases in the last 10 days. On April 5, jawans who had tested positive for the virus in Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) were 522 while now the tally goes up to 2,915.
Apart from this, the total infected jawans who were tested positive in last 24 hours have also increased more than five times. Fifty seven jawans were tested positive on April 5, which now increased to 301 on the 10th day (Thursday).
According to the data, Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and Border Security Force (BSF) have seen the highest spike in number of COVID cases.
The BSF, which had only 20 cases on April 5 has seen a massive spike and on April 15 it witnessed 117 cases in the last 24 hours.
The total number of active cases in BSF stands at 1,850 which was 166 on 10 days back.
Similarly, CRPF which were witnessing four to five cases per day in first week of April has seen massive spike. On April 5, 97 jawans had been tested positive for the virus. The total active cases in CRPF has almost doubled.
Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), which was looking after the COVID centre built in Chhatarpur area of Delhi has also witnessed spike in cases.
In a last 10 days, total number of COVID infected jawans have been increased from 29 to 126.
Situation in other para military forces is also getting bad. CISF which guards Delhi metro and Airports of the country has seen two folds in total number of cases.
Similarly, SSB has seen spike from 19 cases to 86 active cases by April 15.
NSG has better situation as only 10 cases are active and no cases have been reported in last 24 hours.
It is likely that from Monday, paramilitary forces will reduce its staff upto 50 per cent from coming to office and senior officers may be asked to come in staggered timings.
Ministry of Home Affairs in the latest written communication on yesterday has already said that all officers who attend office can stagger timings with entry into the office spread between 9 am to 10 am with corresponding office exit timings. This will also avoid the rush in commuting, as also in lifts and corridors.
Up to the Under-Secretary level, officers are allowed to work from home up to a minimum restricted attendance but above Under-Secretary there is no exemption from coming from the office. (ANI)