Overview
- Amit Shah chaired the Land Border Districts’ Superintendents of Police Conference on Thursday, July 9, where the Home Ministry formally made the four-layer Smart Border plan and the Demography Mission operational across border districts.
- The Smart Border creates a quadrangular security grid that ties border guarding forces, state and district administrations, central agencies and local communities into coordinated surveillance and reporting systems.
- The government announced a plan to fence the 1,610-km India–Myanmar border at an estimated cost of Rs 31,000 crore and said border infrastructure has expanded about 400 percent in recent years under a technology-driven approach.
- Officials framed infiltration as the main cause of 'abnormal' demographic change, ordered rapid upward reporting by local police, and set a three-year target to severely disrupt narcotics networks while also addressing drones, smuggling and organised crime.
- The initiative pairs security measures with development efforts such as the Vibrant Villages Programme to make frontier areas more livable, and officials said the conference—attended by SPs from 119 border districts and senior central figures—will be a model for coastal border work next.