00:00 Namaskar.
00:01 Welcome to another episode of Editorial.
00:04 Now, there are certain topics that one talks because those topics are relevant, they are
00:12 trending.
00:13 And like I normally say, there are certain topics that one talks that may not be trending,
00:18 that may not get views, that may not even generate interest, but that's important for
00:23 our country.
00:25 And today's topic is one such topic.
00:28 You see, 10 suicides were recorded in CRPF in the last 23 days.
00:35 10 suicides.
00:36 And this report is of September 5th, 2023.
00:41 Why are so many people committing suicide in CRPF?
00:45 Let's ask this question.
00:46 Let's get right into the show.
00:52 Now, the Central Reserve Police Force, CRPF, is the world's largest central armed police
01:02 force.
01:03 It is the world's largest.
01:04 Now, between 12th August and 4th September, that is two days back, 12th August and 4th
01:12 September, 10 people committed suicide.
01:16 This is alarming.
01:17 Now, it is not just now, this has been happening far too many times now.
01:22 For instance, the numbers are actually very alarming.
01:25 As per the official data, four-year period from 2018 to 2021, they registered a worrying
01:32 rise in suicide amongst CRPF.
01:35 In 2018, 36 jawans committed suicide, 40 in 2019, 54 in 2020, and 57 in 2021.
01:47 Now, in 2022, the numbers came down slightly, but it is still at 47.
01:55 This is the status currently.
01:57 Now, this is what we are talking about.
01:59 Now, I will also give you some more figures.
02:02 Now, let me talk to you about CAPF, that is Central Armed Police Force, CAPF.
02:09 What is CAPF?
02:10 CAPF is the combination of Central Reserve Police Force, that is CRPF.
02:15 It is a combination of Border Security Force, Shastra Seemabal, Indo-Tibetan Force, Central
02:21 Industrial Security Force, Assam Rifles and National Security Guard.
02:26 They put together.
02:27 That is the central CAPF.
02:29 And if you see CAPF, 1532 CAPF personnel committed suicide in the last 13 years.
02:38 This is alarming.
02:39 You know why this is alarming?
02:40 This is alarming because the forces committing suicide, the deaths due to suicide is more
02:48 than the death due to encounter, encounter with Naxalites or local riots or whatever.
02:53 Now, let me tell you, there was a task force set up.
02:56 This task force was supposed to figure out what is the issue, why are these suicides
03:02 being committed.
03:03 And this task force came out with a report which said that the discrimination among sub-groups,
03:09 the trauma of being abused, bullying at workplace, fear of initiation of disciplinary action
03:16 or legal action and the lack of communication between the company commander and the jawans
03:21 were some of the reasons cited by the task force formed to look into suicide cases in
03:27 CAPF.
03:29 Now the same task force says that among other reasons of suicide, the task force also recorded
03:36 that extended working hours, inadequate time to rest, recreation, lack of job satisfaction
03:43 as compared to their counterparts in other sectors, sense of isolation, lack of social
03:48 as well as familial support and lack of robust grievance re-addressal cell is the cause of
03:55 these suicides.
03:56 Now some reports, some reports claim that it has come to light that most of the suicide
04:02 that happens in the force are also attributed to reasons such as family disputes, marital
04:07 discords, other personal reasons, illness, besides a few instances where professional
04:13 reasons were involved.
04:14 So there is another report that says no, no, no, it is nothing to do with the professional
04:18 working environment.
04:19 Some of it are, but most of it are because of marital reasons and personal reasons and
04:22 so on and so forth.
04:24 Now the point that I am trying to make and why should it concern us is because a) these
04:30 are people who protect us.
04:32 See these two are people who put their lives on the line for us.
04:37 They are our first protection when it comes to a riot, when it comes to naxalism, when
04:43 it comes to terrorism, they are the first line of protection for us.
04:47 And it is imperative that we as a nation look after their benefit.
04:51 Now if you look at all the reasons narrated below, I have shown you some of it, there
04:57 are lot of it, but I have shown you most of it.
05:00 Most of these are HR related issues.
05:03 Not being given enough time to rest, not being given enough time to go to their family, have
05:09 a social and familial support, not being given enough time to have the me time or as they
05:16 call it the work life balance.
05:18 These are some of the issues that has come up.
05:22 The other issues are management issues.
05:25 Management issues where there is bullying in the unit, there is bullying in his office,
05:31 he is not given self-respect, there is no self-respect that they get.
05:35 The working environment is poor and most importantly, most importantly, this is based out of some
05:41 personal experiences dealing with police across the state.
05:45 My personal experience is the way a senior officer treats a junior officer.
05:51 A junior officer is almost treated like a slave, especially IPS officers, top officers
06:00 who comes as directly are planted as bosses in the units, the way they treat their subordinate
06:08 is at times borderlines inhuman, it borderlines inhuman.
06:14 And I am sure a lot of IPS professionals will agree to me, a lot of them will agree to me.
06:20 Because it depends a unit, when you walk into a unit, this is my personal experience, when
06:26 you walk into a unit, you can actually see, feel the unit.
06:29 If the unit commander is a good guy, is a person who treats people well, is a person
06:35 who believes in human resources and development, is a person who believes in creating a good
06:40 environment, that unit is very vibrant, is very good.
06:46 You have very energetic people in that unit.
06:49 But the moment and a lot of these officers are, the moment you have these officers who
06:54 do not care a damn about their people, who practices the worst human resources development
06:59 practices in their units, who treats their subordinates like dirt, if you go to this
07:05 unit, you can feel that in that unit, you can feel the discontent, the tension, the
07:13 complete, that unit, that environment tells you that nothing is right in that unit.
07:20 And you do not need to be a rocket scientist to understand this.
07:22 I have run companies and I know when I see management going wrong and that's precisely
07:28 what happens in some of these units.
07:30 While these, after the task force, there are certain steps that have been taken, no doubt
07:35 about it, some steps have been taken and the steps that have been taken are, they have
07:39 created something called as buddy system, where as far as the system, two jawans are
07:43 paired together for each other, so that there is a bond between two jawans, so that there
07:47 is some kind of a social interaction between these two people.
07:51 There is chowpal system where the CRPF personnel officers hold informal discussion, the boss
07:57 sits with the people and say, "Batao, kya batata hai?"
07:59 But I'll tell you, a lot of this I have also seen, maybe not of CRPF, but of police, but
08:04 I have also seen, you see, nobody has the guts to go, there is no free discussion and
08:08 all that happens, unless and until, like I told you, that officer is a real, real good
08:12 HR person who believes in human resources development.
08:15 Otherwise, you don't see all this kind of free inflow and outflow of discussion.
08:21 You know, all that doesn't happen.
08:22 You know, the discussion is restricted, you say anything wrong and the officer, you had
08:25 it.
08:26 So, the fact is, but all the same, the chowpal system has been followed, the grievance readdressal
08:31 system has been made effective and easier to access supervisory officer.
08:36 All these are said.
08:37 Now, I don't know how much of this actually happens on ground.
08:41 All these are said that you could go and talk to the top officers and all that, yeh sab
08:44 bola jaata hai.
08:45 But kitna hota hai, how much of it happens, one doesn't know.
08:49 The reason I said it is important for us is because 50,155 personnel have quit paramilitary
08:56 force in the last five years.
08:58 Half a lakh of people have quit paramilitary force in the last five years.
09:03 Now, imagine in a country like ours, where we have huge amount of unemployment, huge
09:08 amount of unemployment, half a lakh of people have quit their jobs in paramilitary and possibly
09:16 doing something else or maybe a lot of them doing nothing, jobless.
09:21 Imagine the level in which a person has been pushed.
09:26 It is very easy for a person to have developed tremendous amount of stress.
09:31 You see, the fact that when you need a leave because you need to visit your family, need
09:35 to see your mother, you get homesick, you may want to attend a family function, a sister's
09:41 wedding, when you don't get those leave and these people don't at times.
09:45 You see, it changes much more into a leave application.
09:49 That's when you snap and that's when a lot of these people snap.
09:52 And I tell you like again and again, I say, I've seen a lot of this happen.
09:56 I've seen a lot of this happen in a very close quarters.
10:00 I have three suggestions of my own.
10:03 Number one, during the UPSC training, during the IPS training, officers training, these
10:12 officers should be trained and should be given tremendous impetus, should be given on human
10:19 resources and development.
10:21 Managing a team, managing people, managing psychs, managing emotions, managing bonding,
10:28 these people should be given tremendous impetus on that.
10:30 That's my point number one.
10:31 My point number two is every unit should have a climate study, an environment climate study,
10:41 which normally a lot of corporates do.
10:43 Climate study will ensure that the top management, the top officers would come to know as to
10:48 how the unit is doing and whether people in that particular unit are happy or not.
10:53 It also gives an insight about the officer who is heading, the CEO, the commanding officer
10:58 who is heading that particular unit.
11:01 Last but not the least, the commander who is heading the unit or the officers.
11:07 In fact, the officers, there should be an evaluation system, there should be an appraisal
11:13 system for officers based on the unit environment.
11:18 If their environment is good, the officers should benefit out of it.
11:21 The officer should be given that plus point that he can manage an environment well.
11:26 And if the environment is bad, one will soon find out with two or three units when the
11:31 environment is bad and the officer is the same, you will immediately find out that the
11:36 officer is not capable to create good environment.
11:40 The officer is not a good manager.
11:42 You will immediately find that out.
11:46 The next time when you see a CRPF jawan or an SRPF jawan for that matter of fact, a paramilitary
11:52 person standing on the street, please understand that man is working as hard as any other police,
11:59 any other army personnel.
12:01 He is laying his life on the line.
12:04 He is laying his life on the line too.
12:07 The environment that he is working is as hard, maybe he is not in a minus 40 degree centigrade,
12:13 but the environment that he is working is as hard.
12:16 His working environment, his living environment is dumb.
12:19 At times they sleep in barracks where you can't even stand because of the sting.
12:26 They sleep in barracks like that.
12:28 At times they sleep in their vans.
12:31 So there is a genuine problem, there is a definite problem and this India has to be
12:36 aware of because they are us, they are Indians, we are responsible for them too.
12:42 Somehow as a country, we only seem to mourn, we only seem to bother about these jawans
12:50 when something bad happens to them.
12:52 When there is a Balakot or when there is a terrorist attack or when there is an exile
12:57 attack, only then we seem to be bothered about these jawans.
13:02 I think India should be bothered about them now and India should say that we are responsible
13:08 for them.
13:09 Their health, their well-being is the responsibility of our country.
13:14 That is the point why I wanted to do this editorial.
13:17 Till I see you next time, that is tomorrow at 10 pm.
13:21 Namaskar.
13:22 Namaskar.
13:24 Namaskar.
13:26 Namaskar.
13:28 Namaskar.
13:30 Namaskar.
13:32 Namaskar.
13:34 Namaskar.
13:35 (explosion)
13:37 you
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