Ex-Servicemen Help Fight Naxalites in Bihar

New Delhi, May 11 (UNI) Former soldiers have picked up arms again -- this time to fight the rising menace of Naxalite violence in Bihar.

Raised last year, the Bihar Auxiliary Force recruited 5,000 ex-servicemen during November and December. The 'young' force, consisting of veteran soldiers, proved its mettle when the ex-servicemen foiled a Maoist raid on a bank under Riga police station in Sitamarhi district near the India-Nepal border recently, according to Major General Harwant Krishan, Director General- Resettlement (DGR).

Talking to mediapersons on the sidelines of a training course for retiring soldiers here today, Maj Gen Harwant Krishan further disclosed that the Rajasthan government had hired some 1,200 ex-servicemen as forest guards.

The desert state was stunned two years ago when a Wildlife Institute of India survey confirmed that a poaching mafia had decimated the entire -- sixteen to eighteen -- tiger population of the Sariska reserve.

General Krishan said DGR had helped secure re-employment for about 16,000 ex-servicemen since January last. In Haryana, the ex-servicemen have been found useful for meter-reading jobs in private agencies contracted by the Haryana State Electricity Board and for undertaking 'Below Poverty Line' head count in the state.

Talks were in an advanced stage with the Delhi Metro and Delhi Transport Corporation to institutionalise a framework for recruitment of ex-servicemen, DGR Krishan said.

Earlier, Maj Gen Krishan addressed about 50 soldiers -- due for retirement shortly -- undergoing a two-day Career Transition Course for Personnel Below Officers Rank (PBORs) at the Rajputana Rifles Regimental Centre in Delhi Cantonment.

Representatives of five private companies were present on the occasion to brief about employment opportunities and possible campus recruitment. The companies had been asked to maintain a salary bar to avoid exploitation of ex-servicemen, DGR Krishan said.

Due to the high attrition rate in the Armed Forces, re-employment of ex-servicemen is a priority for the government and DGR has rendered yeoman service in their rehabilitation.

About 60,000 men of the country's roughly 1.2 million strong Armed Forces retire every year -- comprising about five per cent of the workforce.

UNI