BDF officers benefit from ITEC programme
Pini Bothoko | Tuesday March 28, 2017 16:09
A total of 44 BDF personnel received ITEC certificates from the High Commission of India to Botswana last Friday. More than 300 BDF officers have benefited from this programme.
According to the High Commissioner of India Dr Ketan Shukla, Botswana and India signed a Defence Forces Agreement in 1978, and his country provided expert training. He said the first Indian Army Training Team (IATT) came to Botswana as a small contingent of signal personnel.
“Consequent to rapid expansion of the BDF, formation of Air Wing and increasing training requirements in 1981, a complete all arms team was deputed from India to Botswana.
The first Indian Air Force training team consisted of engineers and technicians and later in 1982, All Purpose Flying Instructors began imparting training in flying operations,” he said.
Shukla, who is a special representative to SADC, explained that over the last few decades, defence cooperation between the two countries has grown from strength to strength.
“The training programmes on security and strategic studies, defence management, counter-insurgency, and others, are organised for defence personnel in prestigious institutions like National Defence College, Defence Services Staff College, covering all the three wings of the defence services that is the army, navy and air force,” he said.
Shukla said India was considering the country’s proposal to allocate 75 slots for the year 2017/2018 compared to 50 slots that had been allocated the previous years.
“The utility of ITEC programme has been reflected in the increasing number of participants. It has been offered to more than 150 countries.
In 2016/2017, over 12,000 scholarship slots were offered under the ITEC/SCAAP programme in the 47 premier training institutions in India, which conducted more than 280 training courses in diverse subjects,” he said. For her part, the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Defence, Justice and Security, Segakweng Tsiane said the cooperation between the two countries’ defence forces extended beyond the formative years of the BDF. “BDF prides itself in being a highly skilled professional force and your Government has made a contribution due to the exchange programme that has existed between us and your Defence Forces.
We therefore appreciate programmes such as ITEC, which are demand-driven, response-oriented and focused on addressing many needs of developing countries through innovative technological cooperation between India and partnering nations, including military training,” she said.