The formation and establishment of the BSF

Before the BSF was formed the police forces of the Indian states which were located on the Indian borders were entrusted with the task of gaurding the borders. In times of emergency these forces were buttressed by the Indian Army and the Central Reserve Police personnel who were rushed ad hoc to border areas under particular threat. These police forces dealt with trans-border crimes like cattle theft, abductions, murders, smuggling, land disputes and incursions made by foreign troops. The system of border policing used by these forces, which would be inherited and refined by the BSF later, was based on setting up border outposts at regular distances or at sensitive points and possible day and night patrolling by armed border guards. It is said that these state police forces gave their best in the circumstances created by the division of India in 1947 which opened the Indian borders to a serious threat of infiltration in the post-colonial context. In the ultimate analysis, and as the experience of border protection in Kashmir and Gujarat proved, these forces proved incapable of ensuring satisfactory protection of the Indian borders against a politically and militarily determined adversary of secular India. These forces were understaffed, carried obsolete weapons, were financially not well endowed, improperly trained and not sufficiently disciplined for the task assigned to them, lacked sufficient reserves, had a large proportion of older men whose mental alertness and physical fitness left a lot to be desired and finally, too heterogeneous for the Army to co-ordinate its actions with1. The inadequacies of the border policing arrangements present in India, highlighted by the border war with China in 1962 inter alia, came to the fore in the border crises of 1965 the year in which the first full scale declared

This section is based on the following: Memorandum for Consideration of the Emergency Committee of Secretaries, GOI, BSF Documents Collection (hereafter Memorandum); Border Management, Faculty of Studies, BSF, BSF Academy, Tekanpur, Gwalior, MP, January 2010; Dr. Surinder Singh, Growth and Functional Dynamics of Border Security Force, Trikuta Radiant Publications, Jammu, 1999; D. Banerjea (ed.), Central Police Organizations Part II, Allied Publishers in collaboration with The West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata, New Delhi, 2005.

War between India and Pakistan occurred. Available literature on the subject suggests that after the death of Pandit Nehru, independent India’s first and long serving Prime Minister, in 1964, it seemed to outsiders that India was headed into an uncertain political future. This gave some opportunities to Pakistan, whose attempt to seize the Kashmir Valley had been foiled by the Indian Army and the Kashmiri people in 1947-48, on the borders. Consequently Pakistani forces tried to re-draw the border between India and Pakistan in the Rann of Kutch. The focus of the Pakistani Army offensive in this region of Gujarat was the Kanjarkot area guarded by the State Reserve Police (SRP) of Gujarat. When the Pakistani incursions began in January 1965, the SRP proved weak against its better armed adversary and some companies of the Central Reserve Police (CRP – later CRPF) were rushed to the area of operations to deal with the situation. These too proved unequal to the task and this state of affairs emboldened the invaders who attacked, in Brigade Strength, the Sardar Post on 09 April 1965 in a surprise move. Finally the Indian Army had to be deployed in some strength to repulse the invasion and restore the Indian national border in Gujarat. These events speeded up the process which produced the BSF within a year of their having elapsed. These warlike events were observed with a strategic seriousness by the mild mannered Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri which probably surprised those who might have thought him incapable of military firmness. In the event, the diminutive PM proved his detractors wrong. In January 1965, under Premier Shastri’s overall supervision, the Emergency Committee of Secretaries set up a study group to examine “the possibility of streamlining and reducing the multiplicity of paramilitary forces in border areas.”

The policy initiative for the creation of a single central force tasked with the protection of India’s long problematic borders had begun. This Study Group, led by Lt. Gen. Kumaramangalam, the ViceChief of the Indian Army, submitted its report to the government in April, 1965. This report was examined by General J.N.Chaudhuri and Shri L.P. Singh, the Home Secretary at the time, who together prepared the blue print for establishing the BSF. After the Pakistani aggression in the Rann of Kutch it had been decided that a “small group consisting of an officer of high standing nominated by the Chief of the Army Staff, a Joint Secretary of the Home Ministry and the Inspector General of Police on Special Duty in the Home Ministry should go into the question of coordination and control of border security arrangements immediately.”3 This was the second group of experts set up to advise the government on border issues. In early May 1965 a meeting of the Home Ministers and the Police Chiefs of all the Indian States was held at the behest of the Prime Minister in Delhi. This meeting concluded with the Prime Minister’s decision to raise a new central force dedicated to India’s border defence. Almost immediately before this, on 22 April 1965, General Chaudhuri, under the pseudonym ‘Military Correspondent’, published an article ‘An Integrated Police Force of Border Defence, Central Control – A Solution to Present Discrepancies’ in the Statesman. In this article, a product of the General’s by then informed opinion on the subject, the main problems of India’s border management and possible solutions to these problems were clearly mentioned:

“Should the responsibility lie with the Police in the initial stages and if so at what stage should the Army take over? What equipment should these border forces have, how should they be organized and under whose control should they act? How should liaison be maintained between the Armed Forces proper and a border force? Should the border be a State or Central responsibility and how should the financial burden be shared? Police arrangements as constituted along the border at present seem confused and nobody seems to be quite sure4.”

Finally the reports of the two study groups were merged and submitted to an adhoc group of Secretaries which met in New Delhi on 16 November, 1965. This committee examined the merged documents and came to “certain conclusions” which formed the basis for the establishment of the BSF. The 1965 war with Pakistan was over but the events of that tumultuous year in Indian history ultimately led to the official raising of the BSF on 01 December, 1965 under the leadership of its founding Director General, the distinguished Police Officer K.F. Rustamji. The Memorandum presented to the Committee of Secretaries earlier presented various details regarding the strength and deployment of the BSF with respect, particularly, to the “case of Punjab, Rajasthan and Gujarat” which comprised the border with West Pakistan. The BSF was planned with the aim of not only protecting the border with Pakistan but also instilling in the panic-prone border population, a sense of confidence in general. The history of the BSF, as the chapters of this book illustrate, proves that the Force has remained true to this basic objective. The founders of the BSF were clear that establishing a special service to serve India’s border needs “would also enable the Army to keep away from the Border even in periods of some degree of tension.”5 This would give security “in depth” to the country. The effective strength in terms of the battalions needed by the BSF was to be decided with reference to these factors. The experience of border conflicts with Pakistan throughout 1965 guided the process which produced the BSF and the minimum number and necessary equipment of the BSF battalions was calculated on the basis of how the state police forces had fared in that year against the Pakistan Army. Additional strength and the reserve battalions to back the battalions deployed on field duty were also mentioned in the Memorandum. Right in the beginning it was observed that due to the disturbed political conditions prevalent in several states of India in 1965-66, no men from the central forces could be released to raise the new battalions which would constitute the fledgling BSF. Hence it was assumed that the BSF would initially build up its battalions from the border police battalions and reserves available with the various State Governments. This would make Rustamji’s task unenviable because the state forces were ill trained, ill equipped and often lacked suitable manpower. The Memorandum was unambiguous on this score:
“A further disadvantage in having the local (State) battalions deployed on a temporary basis under the operational control of the Border Security Force would be the absence of clear-cut command and control over these battalions. Reorganizing these battalions and giving them cadres and specialized training will have to be with the prior concurrence of the State Government and, to that extent, the Border Security Force will be handicapped operationally6.”

The raising of the BSF meant working with heterogeneous men and material and converting the whole mass into a competent, well led, homogeneous, cohesive service. This was easier said than done. The birth pangs of the BSF are best described in Rustamji’s own words:

“After handing over charge as IGP Madhya Pradesh, I reached Delhi and wrote my joining report on 21 July 1965…I became the head of a one man organization. I was the sole Borderman; nobody below me, nobody above me…After the Indo-Pak War, I went about the task of collecting the men who would assist me in raising the new Force. I handpicked each one of them and got the best of men from the police, the army, air force, the navy and the academic world… Many of the battalions belonging to the states manning the international borders with Pakistan were taken over by us. The twenty five battalions formed the core of the BSF initially. Gradually we built up the strength by sending teams of officers to rural areas all over India to select the sturdy types and raised another twelve battalions. Fifteen more battalions deployed in Jammu and Kashmir were taken over in 1966 and within a year we had fifty-two battalions. The battalions belonging to the different states had their own strength and composition. Since they became part of one organization, it was necessary to bring about uniformity in their strength and composition by readjusting them. The process of reorganizing and readjusting increased the number of battalions to sixty7.”

The task of raising the foundational battalions of the BSF was accomplished side by side with the work of finding suitable officers many of whom were Emergency Commissioned Officers released from the Army. These officers had served in the Indian Army during the 1962 crisis and the war of 1965 and the “experience that these boys had acquired in the army was invaluable” to the young BSF8. From these officers the first lot of 300 was selected as the core of the officers who led the first BSF battalions. Senior officers from the Indian Police joined the service later. In the view of General Chaudhuri the separation of duties between the Army primarily a combat organization and the BSF, a Paramilitary organization whose primary role was border protection and not combating an enemy army, was crucial. Earlier Rustamji had formed a team of senior officers who comprised, it may be said, a sort of original general staff of the BSF. This team included the legendary officers of the BSF like Ranjit Singh, P.R. Rajgopal, K. Ramamurti, P.A. Rosha, Rajdeo Singh, Ran Singh and R.S. Rathore. The BSF high command comprised Ashwini Kumar in Jalandhar, Ram Gopal in Srinagar, P.K. Basu and Golak Majumdar in Calcutta. This team was “full of ideas” and “innovation” was their leitmotif9. The officers selected, or rather handpicked by the experienced Rustamji, had the qualities which are the sina qua non for leadership in any institution set up with a vision. The qualities he looked for, and found, were “courage that is not affected by rumours or setbacks, strength of mind to judge and not be stricken by panic at any important moment, health, mental ability and educational background and finally, the ability to be a leader of men.”10 The model chosen here was of the Indian Army because since the colonial period the Indian Army was considered an apolitical, secular, thoroughly professional and therefore a reliable organization. The involvement of the BSF in the 1971 war with Pakistan and especially its part in the creation of Bangladesh and the sterling role which the BSF continued to play in several theatres of counter-insurgency operations across numerous parts of the country during the 1980s and 1990s recounted in this volume, proved these assumptions of its founder correct. Grooming the service in its formative years was not easy but was accomplished with the cooperation of the Finance Ministry, Home Ministry and the men and officers of the BSF. Though the funds in rupees were easily forthcoming, the economic conditions in the 1960s made it clear that foreign exchange for weapons or communications technology would not be available. This “proved to be a blessing in disguise” because the “efficient technicians” of the BSF got down to improvising the technology at their disposal and “revolutionized” radio communications in its workshops with marvelous “ingenuity.” This early achievement of the BSF should be seen in the contemporary context when complaining against a lack of funds has become universal among all sectors of the government. The degree of self-sufficiency achieved by a young service like the BSF in the 1960s and 1970s was remarkable. Special workshops and factories were set up to overcome the shortage of arms and even produce fully functional 82 mm mortars in Ranchi. There were two areas in which the BSF leadership proved their pioneering skills. In Tekanpur, the BSF started its own rocket programme with experiments carried out on missiles with a range of 200, 300 and 400 yards. Later, under the guidance of eminent scientists like Vikram Sarabhai and A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, who later became the President of India, the BSF rocket team developed rockets with a range of twenty kilometers. “These rockets”, Rustamji tells us, “were used at the instance of the BSF for the first time in the Bangladesh conflict.” Later, more research enabled the BSF to throw “a rocket ninety kilometers from the base” in Pokhran11. Tekanpur would remain significant to Rustamji’s vision of himself as the founder of the BSF. In 1971, after the BSF had firmly planted its feet on the landscape of the country, he expressed a feeling which must be narrated in his own words:
“On a small island in the lake at Tekanpur will lie the remains of my life – metaphorically – and there I would like to remain forever among the young men who train to join the BSF12.”

It was this BSF which was especially mentioned alongside the Indian Army, Air Force and Navy by the Prime Minister of India, Smt. Indira Gandhi, in her address to the meeting of the various police IGs at the IsG Conference on 06 April, 1972 in the following words:
“I would like to say a special word of gratitude and appreciation to the BSF. We all know that they bore the brunt of the Bangladesh crisis for a long while before anybody else was on the scene. I think it is largely because of (the) guidance and courage which they showed that the whole thing went along (in the) right direction i.e. that it led towards a good result13.”

The War with Pakistan and the creation of Bangladesh in December, 1971 proved invaluable to the prospects of the BSF. The war brought home the need for a “re-orientation” of the service. Rustamji’s visits to the two fronts in 1971-72 made this clear. The war made it clear that the main aim of the BSF “should not be frontal attacks on the enemy” but the making of “forward movements in such a manner that the great advantage that they have in the knowledge of the ground and local contacts would be” helpful. This required the ability to move fast and correctly over broken ground and also the ability to use explosives and possess leadership at lower level of such imaginative and aggressive nature that it can do the task allotted to it.”14 During the war, the BSF fought and “fell shoulder to shoulder with the Army.” Although the BSF functioned under a separate enactment, its officers received commissions from the President and “their contribution to the war of liberation” was described by the PM as “crucial.”