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The Times of India’s news dated 27th July 2009 discussed about Defense Minister A. K. Antony’s comments: “Indian Army is short of 11,387 officers.” Talking about these steps, he introduced two solutions namely: 1) Motivation of Service Personnel to stay in the service for a longer time and 2) Attract youth to join the Defense Services. But are these two solutions enough to fill out this shortage of officers? I strongly believe there are many more steps which need to be taken.
Let us do a quick Math here. The Indian Military Academy (IMA) has batch strength of 250 gentleman cadets. So even if we have 3 different yearly batches, we fill out 750 officers every year. According to the analysis, annually the defense services needs 2,100 officers. So eventually if we keep recruiting 750 officers a year, we will take 15 to 20 years to fill up this huge gap of 11,387 officers. After looking at these figures the first solution that comes to my mind is to increase the number of seats for IMA and National Defense Academy (NDA). You might motivate thousands of young kids to join the Indian Army, but do you have enough training facility and space to recruit them? That’s my question.
I myself was recommended as a commissioned officer in the Indian Army through 34 Services Selection Board (SSB), Allahabad. I went to the interview through the Technical/University Entry Scheme. But unfortunately the Indian Military Academy only has 15 seats (out of 250) reserved for Electronics Engineers. So even though I was selected, I was told that out of all the Electronics Engineers selected throughout the nation, my rank was 18th. So eventually I had lost an opportunity to join IMA and become a commissioned officer for the Indian Army. We were a bunch of friends who were so keen to join IMA. Army was our dream career. We worked hard for it. But then we had no chance whatsoever to be a part of it. I wanted to appear for the SSB interview once again but my parents were not so keen this time because they said you will keep losing other opportunities for the sake of IMA, because you don’t know if you will be in the top 15, the next time you appear for the interview. I then took up GRE and came to US for my higher studies. I believe there will be similar stories to tell, all around the nation. I myself have seen candidates appearing for SSB interview almost 6 to 7 times, getting selected but then thrown out just because they were not in the merit list. SSB selects say 1000 candidates and then throws out 750 of them, because the IMA has only 250 vacancies per batch. You tell a candidate that he/she is selected because he/she has the characteristics to be a Defense Personnel. But then after a couple of months you call and say that you don’t have enough seats. Why to recommend 1000 cadets and demoralize 750 of them? Why doesn’t the SSB just freeze the Interview sessions after they select 250 candidates? Due to all these events there is certainly a talk of uncertainty when it comes to joining IMA and motivating the youth for the same.
Another strong factor that comes to my mind is the salary of the officers. In this world of expenses and tight economy, we all think of money and we cannot deny the fact that money is important! What I understand and as stated on the pay allowance page of Indian Army’s website, a ‘Lieutenant’ (lowest rank amongst commissioned officers in the Indian Army) is paid maximum of 10050 rupees a month. The highest ranked officer, who of course will be the ‘Chief of Army Staff’, is paid a fixed salary of 30,000 rupees. So from the rank of a ‘Lieutenant’ to ‘Chief of Army Staff’ there is an overall increment of 20,000 rupees. Now compare these figures to a Software Industry Employee. As a Junior Developer, he starts with 10,000 to 12,000 rupees. In about 5 years he switches around 2 to 3 companies and gets hired as a Senior Developer. Now his salary shoots up to almost 25,000 to 30,000 rupees. It takes almost more than 20 years for a ‘Lieutenant’ to get to the post of ‘Chief of Army Staff’. A Software Industry employee earns the same amount of salary in 5 years. So in the meantime if that Software Industry Employee gets MBA for himself from a decent Business School, in 10 years time his salary pops up to almost 60,000 to 70,000 rupees. Isn’t it obvious for any human being to think on these terms before taking up Army as a career? So I believe the government should look up to some measures where they can raise the salary of Officers or provide them with more facilities. Advertising these concepts will surely motivate youth to join Defense Services.
There might be many more issues which need to be addressed and looked upon seriously. Indian Army is the second largest army in the world and we are one of the most populous democracies in the world! And we are not able to fill a gap of 11,000 officers for our Army? You must be kidding me! I just hope the Defense Minister and his team mold all these issues together, look at the pros and cons from every perspective and take wise and appropriate steps towards building a full fledge Army with no shortage of brave and distinguished officers!
Let us do a quick Math here. The Indian Military Academy (IMA) has batch strength of 250 gentleman cadets. So even if we have 3 different yearly batches, we fill out 750 officers every year. According to the analysis, annually the defense services needs 2,100 officers. So eventually if we keep recruiting 750 officers a year, we will take 15 to 20 years to fill up this huge gap of 11,387 officers. After looking at these figures the first solution that comes to my mind is to increase the number of seats for IMA and National Defense Academy (NDA). You might motivate thousands of young kids to join the Indian Army, but do you have enough training facility and space to recruit them? That’s my question.
I myself was recommended as a commissioned officer in the Indian Army through 34 Services Selection Board (SSB), Allahabad. I went to the interview through the Technical/University Entry Scheme. But unfortunately the Indian Military Academy only has 15 seats (out of 250) reserved for Electronics Engineers. So even though I was selected, I was told that out of all the Electronics Engineers selected throughout the nation, my rank was 18th. So eventually I had lost an opportunity to join IMA and become a commissioned officer for the Indian Army. We were a bunch of friends who were so keen to join IMA. Army was our dream career. We worked hard for it. But then we had no chance whatsoever to be a part of it. I wanted to appear for the SSB interview once again but my parents were not so keen this time because they said you will keep losing other opportunities for the sake of IMA, because you don’t know if you will be in the top 15, the next time you appear for the interview. I then took up GRE and came to US for my higher studies. I believe there will be similar stories to tell, all around the nation. I myself have seen candidates appearing for SSB interview almost 6 to 7 times, getting selected but then thrown out just because they were not in the merit list. SSB selects say 1000 candidates and then throws out 750 of them, because the IMA has only 250 vacancies per batch. You tell a candidate that he/she is selected because he/she has the characteristics to be a Defense Personnel. But then after a couple of months you call and say that you don’t have enough seats. Why to recommend 1000 cadets and demoralize 750 of them? Why doesn’t the SSB just freeze the Interview sessions after they select 250 candidates? Due to all these events there is certainly a talk of uncertainty when it comes to joining IMA and motivating the youth for the same.
Another strong factor that comes to my mind is the salary of the officers. In this world of expenses and tight economy, we all think of money and we cannot deny the fact that money is important! What I understand and as stated on the pay allowance page of Indian Army’s website, a ‘Lieutenant’ (lowest rank amongst commissioned officers in the Indian Army) is paid maximum of 10050 rupees a month. The highest ranked officer, who of course will be the ‘Chief of Army Staff’, is paid a fixed salary of 30,000 rupees. So from the rank of a ‘Lieutenant’ to ‘Chief of Army Staff’ there is an overall increment of 20,000 rupees. Now compare these figures to a Software Industry Employee. As a Junior Developer, he starts with 10,000 to 12,000 rupees. In about 5 years he switches around 2 to 3 companies and gets hired as a Senior Developer. Now his salary shoots up to almost 25,000 to 30,000 rupees. It takes almost more than 20 years for a ‘Lieutenant’ to get to the post of ‘Chief of Army Staff’. A Software Industry employee earns the same amount of salary in 5 years. So in the meantime if that Software Industry Employee gets MBA for himself from a decent Business School, in 10 years time his salary pops up to almost 60,000 to 70,000 rupees. Isn’t it obvious for any human being to think on these terms before taking up Army as a career? So I believe the government should look up to some measures where they can raise the salary of Officers or provide them with more facilities. Advertising these concepts will surely motivate youth to join Defense Services.
There might be many more issues which need to be addressed and looked upon seriously. Indian Army is the second largest army in the world and we are one of the most populous democracies in the world! And we are not able to fill a gap of 11,000 officers for our Army? You must be kidding me! I just hope the Defense Minister and his team mold all these issues together, look at the pros and cons from every perspective and take wise and appropriate steps towards building a full fledge Army with no shortage of brave and distinguished officers!
