The Rovers and Rangers is senior students’ wing- having students enrolled in higher education- of the global Scouts and Guides movement. In the institutions of higher education, the Rovers crews have boys and the Rangers teams have girls as the volunteer members.
The Scouts and Guides movment is a voluntary, non-political, educational movement for young people, open to all without distinction of origin, race or creed, in accordance with the purpose, principles and methods conceived by the founder Lord Baden-Powell in 1907. The voluntary character of Scouting and Guiding emphasises the fact that members adhere to it by their own free will and because they accept the fundamentals of the Movement.
Bharat Scouts and Guides is a Society duly registered under Societies Registrations Act, 1860. It is totally voluntary, non-political and secular Organisation. The National Headquarters of the Bharat Scouts and Guides functioned from Regal Building, Connaught Place, New Delhi, untill 1963. Thereafter, it shifted to its own building and is functioning from Lakshmi Mazumdar Bhawan , 16, Mahatma Gandhi Marg, Indraprastha Estate, New Delhi – 110002. The National Headquarters building was inaugurated in the year 1963 by the then Vice President of India Dr. Zakir Hussain.
The purpose of the Rovers and Rangers/Scouts and Guides movement is to contribute to the development of young people in achieving their full physical, intellectual, emotional, social and spiritual potentials as individuals, as responsible citizens and as members of the local, national and international communities. It is also important to point out that the concept of responsible citizenship, which is one of the fundamental goals of Rovers and Rangers/ Scouts and Guides movment must be understood in a broad context. A person is, first and foremost, an individual. This individual is integrated into his or her community, which is part of a wider political structures e.g. Districts and States- the total expression of which is the sovereign state or country. A responsible citizen must be aware of his or her rights and obligations in relation to the various communities to which he or she belongs.
The principles are the fundamental laws and beliefs which must be observed when achieving the purpose. They represent a code of conduct which characterises all members of the movement.
Rovers and Rangers/Scouts and Guides movement is based upon three broad principles which represent its fundamental laws and beliefs. They are known as: “Duty to God”, “Duty to Others” and “Duty to Self”.
Our patriotism should be of the wider, nobler kind which recognises justice and reasonableness in the claims of others and which leads our country into comradeship with the other nations of the world.
The first step to this end is to develop peace and goodwill within our own borders, by training our youth of both sexes to its practice as their habit of life; so that the jealousies of town against town, class against class and sect against sect no longer exist; and then to extend this good feeling beyond our frontiers towards our neighbours.
Responsibility for the development of a person should assume responsibility for the development of one’s own capacities. This is fully in harmony with the educational purpose of the Rangers and Rovers/Scout and Guides movement whose aim is to assist the young persons in the full development of their potentials – a process which has been called the “unfolding” of the personality.
The “method” is a system of progressive self- education through:
Progressive and stimulating programmes of various activities based on the interests of the participants including games, useful skills and services to the community taking place largely in an outdoor setting in contact with nature.
Any boy or girl student in the age group of 15 to 25 years and enrolled as a regular student in a higher education institution (HEI) can be admitted as a Rover (for boys) or Ranger (for girls) and has to pass through the following sequential stages for completing the full course of this co- curricular activity:
The total sanctioned strength of the Feroze Gandhi Rovers Crew, having boys, and of the Indira Gandhi Rangers Team, having girls, is 24 each. Every year a five- day training camp for ‘Pravesh’ and ‘Nipun’ is organised in the College in which the Rovers and Rangers learn and demonstrate their skills at tent pitching, providing first aid to the injured, tying different types of knots to overcome difficult situations, cooking in camps, holding camp fires etc.and participate in various competitions. On the fifth and closing day of the annual camp, the “Deeksha Sanskaar”, cultural events and prize distribution ceremony are organised. In the end, a ‘Sarva Dharma Praarthhanaa’ is performed.
Apart from participation in the training camp, the Rovers and Rangers perform various duties in the events organised in the College throughout the year including on Independence Day, Republic Day and Annual Sports. They participate in various other social activities cleanliness drives and tree plantation programmes in the College campus.
