GUWAHATI: The Border Security Force (BSF) stares at a manpower vacuum in Tripura’s Dhalai district following the spike in COVID-19 cases.
As many as 62 people, including 54 BSF personnel, wives of two personnel, their five children, and a mess worker of the 138 battalion, had tested positive over the past five days.
Official sources declared the battalion headquarters, its administrative base camp at Gandachara, and Karina border outpost as containment zones.
The 138 battalion headquarters has a strength of 700-800 people including the family members of a section of personnel. Around 200-300 people were being quarantined. The BSF’s 86 battalion headquarters is also located at the same complex.
BSF sources said as of now, there was no manpower crisis. After the Karina border outpost along India-Bangladesh was declared a containment zone, BSF personnel from the adjoining outposts were taking care of that stretch of the border, BSF sources said.
“I agree we will have a vacuum if cases are reported from the border outposts. We have to fill those as we cannot leave the border open. The 168 battalion guards the border in eastern Tripura. There are hills there. Also, movement (of Bangladeshis) is less compared to the porous border in western Tripura,” a senior BSF official told this newspaper.
According to him, the chances of infection are always high in the defence forces and the police as the troops live together and eat together in barracks.
“This is one reason why jawans after jawans got infected in Delhi,” the official added.
The Centre had on Monday declared Ambassa, the district headquarters of Dhalai, as “Red Zone” after the cases were detected from the BSF battalion headquarters.
The infected jawans were undergoing treatment at the GB Pant Medical College and Hospital in Agartala.
The state’s first two patients were a woman and a jawan of Tripura State Rifles. Both have already recovered.