New Delhi: CRPF Director General Sujoy Lal Thaosen took the "additional" charge of the Border Security Force (BSF) on Saturday, following the retirement of incumbent Pankaj Kumar Singh. Singh, a 1988-batch Indian Police Service (IPS) officer of the Rajasthan cadre, handed over the baton of the country's largest border-guarding force to his batchmate from the Madhya Pradesh cadre at the BSF headquarters on Lodhi Road in central Delhi, a spokesperson of the force said.
The outgoing DG hung his boots after reviewing a "farewell parade" presented by the troops at a BSF camp in southwest Delhi, followed by a medal-awarding ceremony for some officers of the force. Singh retired after putting in around 34 years and a half in the IPS, including a 16-month tenure as the BSF chief, a charge he took over on August 31 last year.
Apart from serving in his cadre of Rajasthan Police, Singh has served at the Centre in the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF). He is credited with fortifying and enhancing the border infrastructure for the BSF troops along the India-Pakistan front, apart from setting up a laboratory for a forensic study of the drones shot down after those entered India from Pakistan with drugs and arms.
Singh's BSF appointment last year had created a history -- father and son holding the top post of a paramilitary force in the country. His father, retired 1959-batch IPS officer Prakash Singh, also headed the BSF as its DG from June 1993 to January 1994. Prakash Singh is considered to be an architect of police reforms in the country.
The about-2.65-lakh-personnel-strong BSF guards more than 6,300 kilometres of the Indian boundary with Pakistan and Bangladesh, apart from rendering a variety of roles in the country's internal security domain. Thaosen, who has served in the Special Protection Group (SPG) for long, was appointed the CRPF chief in October. He has earlier worked in the BSF as its special DG.
