Indian Special Forces Training School (SFTS)

Indian Army's Special Forces Training School is the premium training institution for special forces of India such as Para Commandos (India) which is at Nahan, a Hilltown in Himachal Pradesh. It is the largest and most important training institution for Special Forces in India.

Indian Army conducts joint special forces exercise and training with the special forces of countries such as US, Sri Lanka, Russia, France, Bangladesh, Thailand at this school.[1][2][3]

History

A need to reorganize the PARA Commando Battalions was felt as the existing ones were only a tougher version of the infantry. On 15 July 1987 the Chief of Army Staff (COAS) gave his approval for creation of HQ Special Forces and for raising Special Forces Training Wing (SFTW) to cater for course of specialist nature specific to Special Forces which were neither available nor feasible in other schools of instructions. The complete process was delayed due to deployment off all the three commando battalions under an Adhoc Headquarters for OPERATION PAWAN - SRILANKA.[4]

Progressive Development of School

Raised as Part of Headquarters Special Forces. Special Forces School was raised as part of Headquarters Special Forces of War Establishment. The raising was part of up gradation of our Parachute Commando Battalions to the more versatile Special Forces capable of executing a wide variety of strategic and operational tasks, Both overt and covert, in war and low intensity conflict situations. Re -Organization in 1997-98. in December 1997, Special Forces School was reorganized and redesignated as Special Forces Training wing. In January 2003, Army Headquarters Military Operations Directorate, approved the restructuring of Special Forces Training Wing to overcome the drawback in its erstwhile organization. As part of the major policy decisions approved by the COAS, Special Forces Training wing was redesignated as Special Forces Training School, and at the same time as a Cat 'A' Training Establishment for Indian Army.

The school at present is located at its intermediate or temporary location. Land acquisition process for the permanent location of the school is in progress. The Army needs 1,500 acres for the permanent location. The school will have its own airfield in its permanent location.

Role

SPECIAL FORCES TRAINING SCHOOL is a center of excellence for Special Forces training. The school conducts advanced training for nearly all the skills of the special forces soldiers of Indian Army. There are reports that the school is conducting training for special forces of friendly developing nations in the school as a part of its capacity building assistance program for theses nations.

References

  1. ↑ "Indo-US Special Forces to conduct joint wargames 'Vajra Prahar' next month". Terminal X. 2012-09-11. Retrieved 2013-07-01.
  2. ↑ SAIKAT DATTA Posted: Oct 28, 2003 at 0000 hrs IST (2003-10-28). "In Nahan, Army gets its cutting edge". Indianexpress.com. Retrieved 2013-07-01.
  3. ↑ https://web.archive.org/20130320021734/http://www.kanishkasharma.info:80/army.html. Archived from the original on March 20, 2013. Retrieved April 2, 2013. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  4. ↑ http://www.indianarmy.nic.in/Site/FormTemplete/frmTemp1PLargeTC1C.aspx?MnId=hmh2prM+i+gt4ttkjL73LQ==&ParentID=h3Fk4AGH8Z2DdGtHNeLP8g==
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