Centre approves three more IRBs for Odisha

New Delhi: The Centre on Wednesday approved the raising of 17 India Reserve Battalions (IRBs) in the country, including three in Odisha.

The Union Cabinet under the chairmanship of Prime Minister Narendra Modi approved five IRBs in Jammu and Kashmir, four in Chhattisgarh, three each in Odisha and Jharkhand and two in Maharashtra.

The Union Cabinet decided that the major thrust would be on recruitment of local youths for which the states will relax the age and educational criteria, if required.

Seventy five percent of the vacancies of constables will be filled up from 27 core districts in the four left wing extremism (LWE) affected states of Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Maharashtra under Security Related Expenditure (SRE) scheme.

At present, there are eight IRBs in Odisha.

The Centre, which had introduced the IRB scheme in 1971, has so far sanctioned 153 IRBs to various states, out of which 144 IRBs have been raised and one IRB in Jharkhand has been converted into Specialized Indian Reserve Battalion (SIRB) having two engineering companies and five security companies.