A video of a young boy named Pradeep Mehra went viral on social media a few days ago. He was on his way home after completing his daily job. When questioned by the interviewer, he stated that he is planning to join the army. Pradeep Mehra earned a lot of accolades, and he also had a lot of interviews. Certainly, Pradeep’s efforts should be commended, but many lakhs of young people, like Pradeep, take the fields in the villages and run several kilometers every morning and evening in preparation to join the army, and we are unaware of this fact.
We must also note that the state of the forces is deteriorating in the government of Narendra Modi Ji, who came to power in 2014 on a wave of nationalism. During the Modi government’s mandate, more than 1.25 lakh army posts have remained vacant, despite the fact that the government sought votes based on the army’s strength and work. For the last two-and-a-half years, army recruitment has been closed. In December, Minister of State for Defense, Ajay Bhatt, stated on the floor of Parliament that there are 104653 vacancies in the Indian Army, with over 97 thousand soldiers unfilled.
The two intakes every year in the Air Force remained closed for two years
Until roughly two years ago, the Indian Air Force used to make two recruitments every year for the post of airmen, from which about 7000 youths were recruited. The Air Force used to complete both these recruitments on time at an interval of 6 months. But no recruitment has been completed since Corona. The first intake of the year 2020 was to be held in January 2020, and whose examination process was to be completed in 2019. But this intake happened in July 2020 due to Corona.
Later, the second intake of 2020 was pushed forward, and the name was changed to the second intake of 2021. The candidates appeared in the written examination for 2/2021 last July and since then have been waiting for the result. The 1/2022 intake, which was to be held in January, is yet to be ascertained.
The situation with the Navy is also similar. The Indian Navy has been recruiting about 6000 youths every year, but in the years 2020-21, the number of candidates who were enrolled in the Navy was only 2722. Most of these youths are still waiting for their joining letters. In 2021-22, this figure stood at 5547, and this year also, they are waiting for their respective recruitment results or joining letters.
No new soldiers have been recruited into the Army for the past 2 years
Open recruitment in the Indian Army has been closed for the last two years. Earlier, there used to be open recruitment every year at Army Headquarters in which candidates could directly appear for physical examinations. But they, too, were stopped in 2020 in the name of Corona. The recruitments were reopened at the start of the year 2021, but the examinations had not yet been completed. However, the recruitment of officers is going on continuously through the NDA/CDS exams.
According to the Minister of State for Defence, 97 rally recruitments were proposed in 2020-21, out of which the process of only 47 could be started. Out of these 47, only four vacancies could be filled in the written examination. On the other hand, if we talk about 2021-22, then 87 rallies were scheduled to be recruited in this session, out of which the process of only 4 could be started. The examinations have not yet been conducted for all four recruitments. Due to this, not a single new jawan has been recruited into the army in the last two years, while about 50 thousand soldiers retire every year.
Young people getting overage while sitting at home
Candidates are given a very short interval of time for recruitment in the Air Force and Navy, after which they are declared overage. Imagine how many candidates have crossed the age limit in the last two years. The Indian Army is the second-largest army in the world and the second-largest organization in terms of job placement in the country, after Indian Railways. But army recruitments are closed on the pretext of Corona. The NTPC Recruitment 2019 in the Railway Department has so far completed only one phase. The rest of the recruitment was subject to privatization. In such a situation, unemployment has emerged as a major problem.
The government will be recruiting contract soldiers
Meanwhile, another bad news is coming out for the unemployed. The three services have proposed to the high officials of the government of India that soldiers should be recruited on contract for 3 years. It has been decided to call it the “Agneepath Recruitment Entry Scheme,” under which the soldiers to be recruited will be called “Agniveers”. The point to be noted is that the government will neither give pensions to these Agniveers nor will they give any other retirement-related benefits.
In recent years, the country has seen large-scale adoption of the practice of employing contract workers instead of permanent government employees. These contract workers are used by the governments as per their needs, and then, when the need is over, they are fired from the job. Corona health assistants were recruited on a large scale during the Corona era in Rajasthan. Recently, the government has taken the decision to sack them from service when the need is over. Contract employees neither get a proper salary nor any other allowances. Overall, they are hired at very low salaries.
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