Republic Day: 15 ITBP officials get police service medals

Fifteen ITBP officials were awarded the police service medal on the eve of Republic Day, a spokesperson of the border guarding force said on Friday. Second-in-command-rank officer Ratan Singh Sonal, Section Officer C Durai Raj and deputy inspector generals A S Rawat and Nishith Chandra were among the officials decorated with the distinguished and meritorious medal, the spokesperson said.

Sonal, an acclaimed mountaineer who has scaled Mt Everest several times, had led a team of Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) climbers in a daring operation to retrieve the bodies of seven people from near a mountain peak in Uttarakhand last year. Inspector General D K Dimri, DIG S K Sharma and second-in command-rank officer R K Joshi were also among the recipients of the medal.

The about 90,000-personnel strong force is primarily tasked with guarding the 3,488-km long Line of Actual Control with China apart from rendering internal security duties like conducting anti-Naxal operations.