All ranks of the Border Security Force (BSF) deployed in India’s eastern frontier would be assigned to carry a special task from Independence Day — to learn Bengali in its spoken and written forms.
The Union Home Ministry has launched the programme in view of a spate of complaints over human rights abuses and detention of innocent residents by BSF along the border with Bangladesh. India shares a 4,000-km boundary with Bangladesh including 856 km in Tripura and people living on both sides of the border are largely Bengali speaking.
“The learning programme would officially get underway on Independence Day and it would take 90 days to complete,” a BSF official said on condition anonymity. He said BSF soldiers other than the Bengali speaking ones would be enlisted for the language learning.
BSF has 1,125 border out posts (BOPs) along the border with Bangladesh and 245 of them are located in Tripura. Misunderstandings between villagers and BSF personnel often result in tension in the villages close to the border.
Sources said BSF soldiers after qualifying the language course would be deployed at BOPs.
