Commandant Swati Sharma Receives National and State Honours for Contributions to Rajasthan Home Guards

Jaipur ; Commandant Swati Sharma of the Rajasthan Home Guards Service has been conferred two major honours on the occasion of the 63rd Home Guards and Civil Defence Raising Day. She received the State level DG Commendation Disc 2025, while the National-level DGCD Silver Disc and Commendation Certificate announced by the DG Fire Service, Civil Defence & Home Guards, MHA during last year’s Raising Day in 2024 was formally presented to her this year. The awards were handed over by Smt. Malini Agarwal, IPS, Director General, Rajasthan Home Guards, at a ceremony held in Jaipur.

An ex-Captain of the Army Ordnance Corps, Sharma has devoted more than a decade to the Rajasthan Home Guards. Her academic credentials also add to her distinction she is a British Chevening Scholar for 2021–22 and holds an M.Sc. degree in Risk, Disaster and Resilience from University College London (UCL). This specialised training has significantly helped strengthen the department’s preparedness for disaster response and capacity-building.

Commandant Swati Sharma’s recognition comes on the back of several wide-ranging operational and administrative responsibilities she has handled in recent years. During Operation Sindoor, she coordinated closely with the DGCD in Delhi, state authorities and Army establishments to ensure smooth deployment of Border Home Guards. In the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, she planned and supervised the deployment of Home Guards volunteers not only in Rajasthan but also in Madhya Pradesh, Delhi, Punjab along with Haryana vidhan sabha elections. She also led the rollout of the HDMS online deployment software across Rajasthan, which is instrumental in bringing greater transparency and administrative efficiency to the system. She also headed a team that visited Uttar Pradesh to study that State’s Home Guards model for possible adoption of best practices in Rajasthan.

Her portfolio at the State level has been equally diverse. As the State Nodal Officer for POSH matters, the Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) and the Departmental Disaster Management Nodal Officer, Sharma has been responsible for ensuring the Home Guards’ regular participation in statewide mock drills and safety exercises. Training reforms form another major area of her contributions. Commandant Swati Sharma revived the Watermanship Course in Bengaluru after a long break since 2014 and secured seats for Rajasthan personnel at the NDRF Academy in Pune, re-starting the programme after nearly a decade. She introduced a Store Management Course for constables and organised the first joint exercise involving 12 Home Guards and Civil Defence organisations working alongside the NDRF. In addition, she initiated the department’s first Drone Training of Trainers (ToT) workshop for staff and volunteers, marking a step towards technologically updated disaster-response mechanisms.