16 per cent vacancy in CAPFs' officer ranks: Govt

Paramilitary forces like ITBP, SSB, BSF and others are facing a combined vacancy of about 16 per cent in their officer ranks, the government informed the Parliament today.
As per data updated till March 1, the highest number of vacancies in the Gazetted Officers ranks are in the three border-guarding forces-- Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB) at 32 per cent, Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) 27 and the Border Security Force (BSF) at about 10 per cent.
The data was presented by Union Minister of State for Home Kiren Rijiju in a written reply in the Lok Sabha.
While SSB has 856 vacancies against the sanctioned strength of 2,183 officers, ITBP has 584 vacancies against 2,094 approved posts and the BSF has 522 vacancies against 5,309 posts.

In other organisations like the Central Reserve Police Force, the vacancy in the officers rank is 441 against 5,410 posts, 210 in the Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) against 1,556 posts and 260 against 1,268 posts in the Assam Rifles.
These vacancies thus total upto 2,873 as compared to 17,820 sanctioned posts, which is about 16 per cent, the data revealed.
The overall vacancies in these forces, also called Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs), is 21,430 in all the ranks against the total sanctioned mapower of over 9.7 lakh.
"Filling up of vacancies is an ongoing and continuous process, as they arise due to reasons such as new raising, retirements, resignations among others. Vacancies are filled through various methods of recruitment such as direct recruitment, promotion or deputation as prescribed in the recruitment rules," Rijiju said.