National Disaster Response Force to raise two more battalions soon: Director General OP Singh

PATNA: National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) will raise two more battalions to strengthen its cadre in view of enormity of the task, its Director General O P Singh said today.

"Two more battalions will be raised from SSB soon in addition to existing 10 battalions raised from CRPF, CISF and other armed forces," Singh told reporters at the headquarters of 9th battalion at Bihta in Patna district.

The NDRF won accolades for rescuing more than 50,000 people during recent floods in Jammu and Kashmir and evacuating people living on the sea coast in Odisha and Andhra Pradesh during cyclone Phailin.

Singh, who has been named Director General of NDRF by the Union government 10 days ago, said that the Central government has accepted the proposal for recruitment of engineers, doctors, paramedics staff on contract basis for 3 to 5 years to overcome shortage of manpower in the force.

Earlier, they were recruited only at the time of disaster for a shorter period of time which attracted fewer people to join them.

He said to motivate personnel, the central government has also decided to provide "NDRF response medal" to personnel who completes three year in the dedicated disaster management force.

The NDRF DG stressed on specialised training and research for adding efficiency in their work.

"At present NDRF response time is 20 minute which is of international level," he said.

NDRF, which had done commendable work during landslide in Uttarakhand and floods in Assam and Meghalaya recently, would deploy All Terrain Vehicle (ATV) more frequently seeing its utility in J & K flood, he said.

ATV could move even in 4-5 feet of water. It proved successful during rescue operation in J&K, he said.

Flanked by Commandant of 9th battalion Vijay Sinha, Singh said personnel would be provided more specialized training for rescue of animals during flood and other distress.

"Animal disaster management will be the focus area for future," he said.

The NDRF DG said that emphasis would be given to impart language training to personnel so as to relate with locals during time of crisis.

NDRF whose work during recent flood threat in Kosi belt from Nepal and derailment of Delhi-Dibrugarh Rajdhani near Chhapra was appreciated, would provide training to community people.

The community programme would be two-fold, target specific and general, the DG said.

In the target based training programme, community of fishermen and those living on the river bank and sea shore would be given specialised training to help them act promptly during time of crisis, the NDRF DG said.

The DG was shown demonstration in rescue during gas leakage in any industrial establishment and fire in high rise building by men of 9th battalion.

The 9th battalion of NDRF based at Bihta caters to need of 38 districts of Bihar and 27 of Uttar Pradesh in its eastern part.