It's evening. In a sprawling landscaped ground, thousands of young men are stretched out on exercise mats in neat rows and columns. Bhujang Asana, Manduka Asana, Pranayam, they are doing it all. Nothing out of the ordinary except that they are paramilitary personnel.It's stress-busting time at the 25th Battalion BSF camp at Chhawla, located on the outer edges of west Delhi. The workouts are part of a 10-day 'shivir', a workshop on yoga and pranayama by Baba Ramdev and his shishyas.

The huge scale shows the seriousness with which organizers the Welfare and rehabilitation Board (Warb) want to arrest stress among soldiers. "The 3,000 men from CRPF, BSF, ITBP, CISF, Assam Rifles, SSB and NSG trained here will teach 300,000 in 6 months and the entire 750,000 troops within a year," says R P Singh, IG (Admn) CRPF and MemberSecretary, Warb.

Paramilitary forces have reported incidents of fratricidal killings and suicides in recent times. "Stress has always been a big factor in the forces," says former DG, BSF, Prakash Singh. And, though officers at the camp deny that stress is a worrying issue, the ongoing shivir is obviously a means to combat the silent killer. Several factors lead to rising stress levels. Working in conflict zones facing an invisible enemy for long periods can fray the steadiest of nerves. But even denial of leave or denying a family gas connection is known to trigger violent outbursts.

Talking to each other on the tension building up inside can hel but jawans don't seem to exercise that option. "Despair and anger first feed on a soldier's physical health. Then it gnaws away at his mental state till the point he snaps, at times ending in his killing colleagues and seniors or committing suicide," says 26-year-old M Kumar of CRPF, who belongs to Andhra Pradesh but is now posted in Bihar.

He hastens to add, "But it's never happened in our camps. More in the army, I think." It is this pervading sense of denial that Baba Ramdev and his brood of trainers tried to crack in the first session itself. "He told us that civil society faces the same anxieties that we do, so how are we different? There are as many cases of suicide in civil life too, if not more," says A P Pagar of the CISF.

For morale and peace, nothing beats "a close rapport between the officer and his men", says Singh who has an "uncomfortable feeling of some kind of distance between officers and his men". While such camps go a long way in promoting the sense of welfare among troops, the best antidote to disruptive behaviour is ensuring commands operate as a close-knit unit.

But in the absence of such rapport and leadership qualities, large-scale healing processes seem to be in order. Life for the perky Sanjay Singh, now posted in Assam, has drastically changed since he joined the BSF two years ago. Stress is not an identified condition for him. Stress is what happens "in other camps," he says. But he plans to "teach as many people as possible" what he learns in these sessions because "you get mental strength".

There's conviction that yoga will benefit. A mat is all you need. "This is the best thing to do when you can't get out for your exercise regime, either because it's snowing or there simply isn’t place to step out," says Meerut's Sunder Lal, posted in Srinagar with the CRPF. If belief in and practise of yoga can bring in a sense of calm among the forces, Warb will have met with some success. But perhaps the real 'jagrukta' (awareness) will unfold only when the soldiers snap out of the denial mode.