The CRPF faces its biggest challenge in Naxal areas and will focus on minimising troop casualities as it takes on the Left wing extremists, the new chief of the country’s largest paramilitary said here on Saturday. Senior IPS officer Dilip Trivedi on Saturday took over as the director- general (DG) of the force which is in the thick of the action against Maoists in various parts of the country.
Mr Trivedi, a 1978-batch IPS officer of Uttar Pradesh cadre, was till now serving as the special DG of the BSF at its headquarters here. “The biggest challenge for the force is in the Left Wing Extremism theatre and we will aim to minimise the damage on our side while inflicting as much as we can on the Naxals,” Mr Trivedi said after taking over the new assignment.
The new chief, who had experience working in paramilitary forces like BSF and ITBP earlier in his career, said there are other challenges also for the three-lakh strong force like Jammu and Kashmir, Northeast, variety of duties in the internal security domain and the forthcoming Assembly polls in few states and the general elections.
Mr Trivedi, in his early days in the Indian Police Service, has served in various positions in UP police and at the Centre as ADG of the ITBP before going to the Border Security Force. The new DG was given a ceremonial “guard of honour” before he took charge at the CRPF headquarters here.