The Union Ministry of Home Affairs has tasked personnel of the Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs), including Assam Rifles and the NSG, to geotag all the saplings they planted as part of a tree planting drive that started in 2020 in their campuses and neighbourhoods across the country. They have been asked to upload details regarding the saplings on the Government Land Information System (GLIS) portal. An MHA official said that from 2020 to 2022, over 3.55 crore saplings were planted by personnel of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), Border Security Force (BSF), Sashastra Seema Bal (SSB), Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP), Central Industrial Security Force (CISF), Assam Rifles (AR), and National Security Guard (NSG) – which together comprise the Central Armed Police Forces. On December 26, the BSF – a nodal agency for this initiative – said in a communication to all the CAPFs that the saplings must be numbered, and that this should be “based on force name, year of plantation/IG headquarter/DIG HQ “Chief Nodal Officers, BSF have requested to upload the details of plantation done on government land Information system (GLIS) portal within two to three days. Therefore, numbering of saplings planted by CRPF during Plantation Drive 2020 to 2023 may please be done immediately as per the mechanism decided by the MHA. Further, details of plantation done may also be uploaded on GLIS portal immediately and a fortnightly ATR on all the directions may please be forwarded on 2 and 17 of every month,” the communication said. According to the ministry’s annual report for 2022-23, CAPFs have been undertaking plantation drives in their campuses and neighbourhoods. “On the clarion call given by the Union Home Minister, CAPFs have undertaken an organised mass scale plantation drive in their campuses and places of deployment across 28 States and 6 Union Territories. This achievement by CAPFs, Assam Rifles and NSG indicates not only their concern for the environment but also their commitment to the social cause,” the report said. As per the report, the CAPFs will endeavour to carry out the planting of about one crore saplings per year over the next four years. Giving a yearly breakdown of the number of saplings, the report said the CAPFs planted 1.47 crore saplings in 2020, 1.07 crore in 2021 and 1.01 crore in 2022. The figure for 2023 was not yet available.
