CRPF has launched unique bike ambulances amidst their anti-Maoist operations in Madhya Pradesh, intended at providing basic healthcare facilities to those living in remote jungle areas of Balaghat region.

Medical teams, accompanied by well-armed security personnel ride their motorcycles to help the sick and injured in remotest villages the area district that shares its border with the worst Maoist violence-hit districts in neighboring Chhattisgarh and Maharashtra.

Commandant of the 123th CRPF battalion Sudhir Kumar – who had launched these bikes in Bastar region, said that bikes were initially a given a few years back for anti-Naxal patrols as four-wheelers were easy for the ultras to target.
“We though to utilising it in better way so that locals could be helped. Jungles of Balaghat are tougher than those in Chhattisgarh. This initiative would help a lot ” he added.

A field surgical team, comprising a doctor, a paramedic and an assistant, are part of the bike ambulance team. They would go to villages either as part of a patrol or are called in by the villagers in need, said the officer. These bike ambulances would rush the critically ill to hospitals in the district headquarters.

During operations CRPF teams will carry medicines used to treat regular health issues prevalent in these areas like malaria and typhoid. This new initiative is also a step towards widening the Central Reserve Police Force’s (CRPF) civic action work that is traditionally conducted to befriend the locals by providing household items to them using government funds, under roads by Naxals to ambush security forces, apart from getting cooperation in rendering our other duties,” Kumar said.

The story has been extracted from https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/bhopal/bike-ambulances-launched-in-maoist-hit-balaghat/articleshow/94141169.cms