COVID-19: BSF provides sanitisers, masks to farmers for safe harvesting along Pak, B'desh borders

The Border Security Force is undertaking massive mobilisation of logistics and sanitisation equipment along the Indian borders with Pakistan and Bangladesh to ensure that farmers, involved in tilling of fields across the fence, are protected from coronavirus during the upcoming harvesting season, officials said on Monday.

The 553-kms long Punjab frontier of BSF, which has maximum farming lands along the Pakistan front that also runs across Jammu, Rajasthan and Gujarat, had distributed 3,000 face masks till now to villagers and those who go for tilling the land across the fence.

Over 22,000 hand-made masks have been prepared by the wives welfare association of the force in the frontier. These masks will be distributed to the personnel, farmers and villagers in the coming days as the harvesting work will gather momentum from the next week, the officials said.

"The distribution of masks will increase once farmers start moving ahead of the fencing for harvesting. BSF posts that man these gates are being sent adequate number of sanitisation items, masks and other logistical goods," a senior BSF officer said.

The force, the officials said, has deployed trucks to transport digital thermometers, wooden tables, chairs and plastic tanks to erect hand sanitisation and wash points at various fence gates so that the farmers and other farm labourers can use them while entering and exiting the fields.

The border fence is erected about 150 yards on the Indian side from the Indo-Pak international border and the farmers have to go to designated iron gates to access their fields.

The Punjab frontier has about 400 such gates, of which about 180-200 gates, are opened for farmers in different shifts during peak harvesting or sowing season, the officer said, adding the agricultural equipment are also being sanitised.

Some of these farming gates are also in Jammu, Rajasthan (over 50) and Gujarat (over 270), another official said.

He, however, said those who cross over the fence will also be frisked as usual with a hand-held metal detector as these areas are vulnerable to narcotics and arms smuggling.

Over two dozen awareness programs about the coronavirus pandemic have also been conducted by the BSF personnel in border villages, informing the residents about the importance of hygiene, physical distance between people and other medical protocols.

Along the international border with Bangladesh, the security force has initiated similar measures to ensure that the virus, which has killed thousands and infected over 10 lakh people across the globe, does not spread among the farmers and those who live across the fence.

Various units of the force are also running special camps providing cooked food, grains, pulses, rice, water and masks to the border population.

At the Petrapole crossing at India-Bangladesh international border in West Bengal, the force has been providing food and other essentials everyday to truck drivers and their associates who have been stranded on the Indian side since the countrywide lockdown was declared, the officer said.

In the South Bengal frontier of the force, which secures over 900 kms of the 3,096 km long border, there are about 450 fence gates. The North Bengal frontier has about 600 such gates, out of which about 300 are operational.

Farmers are being provided with all COVID-19 related sanitisation materials before they go to their fields beyond the fence but before the international border, an officer of the force posted in the region said.

Union Home Minister Amit Shah had also recently reviewed security measures at these two sensitive border fronts. He had directed the force to enhance vigil and ensure no cross-border movement takes places, especially in the non-fenced areas.

The minister had also asked the force to spread coronavirus awareness among farmers by launching more and more civic action work.