There is a perceptible fall in the number of participants for the private security guard training, which is in progress at the Armed Reserve Campus, when compared to last year. Compared to nearly 200 participants last year, this time around, there are only 85 trainees, including seven women for the 20-day programme that commenced recently. The decline in the turnout is surprising because placement for successful trainees was quite impressive last year – as many as 142 trainees were employed by private companies, educational institutions, women’s hostels, textile mills, and retail showrooms.
Though trainees are entitled to free food and refreshments, some among them observe that a daily conveyance allowance or stipend would have ensured better turnout. The training encompassing 100 hours of classroom instruction and 60 hours of field training was initiated by the Deputy Superintendent of Police, District Crime Records Bureau, A. Suryakala, in the presence of the District Employment Officer Vasudevan. According to the trainers, at the end of the training to be provided under the aegis of Tamil Nadu Skill Development Mission, the participants would be placed in jobs with minimum monthly salary of Rs. 10,000. The minimum prescribed qualification is a pass in Standard VIII.
The training would cover physical fitness, frisking, providing security to assets, fire fighting, crowd control, scrutiny of identification documents, arms licence, and identification of improvised explosive devices, besides first aid, crisis response, basic knowledge of Indian Penal Code, and the procedure involved in lodging First Information Report. Like last year, there have been several enquiries, and all participants who complete the training are certain to be placed at the end of the training, Ms Suryakala said. Every trainee has been provided with a handbook on skill training for security guards prepared by the Police Training College, Ashok Nagar, Chennai.
