ITBP to replace Assam Rifles at Indo-Myanmar border

Finally, the decks have been cleared for the long-standing demand of the home ministry (MHA) to hand over the India-Myanmar border to the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) by replacing Assam Rifles, the country’s oldest paramilitary force, with the Defence Ministry (MoD) giving its nod.

Sources in the ITBP told to Millennium Post that all the modalities of shifting the guard on the border were in final stage and set to come out very soon. “We will start guarding the 1,624-km-long India-Myanmar border that passes through the states of Nagaland, Mizoram, Manipur and Arunachal Pradesh,” said an ITBP official.

Sources in MoD also confirmed that the ITBP is a specialized mountain Force and given their experience of guarding an high altitude mountainous terrain like the Indo-China border they have been selected for the task.

Earlier this year, the defence ministry had decided to “withdraw” the Assam Rifles- a force commanded and controlled by the Army- from the Myanmar border on the premise that, under international conventions, borders are not guarded by armies. As per international conventions, borders should be guarded by “specialised police or paramilitary forces and not by the army”.