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| India Reorganizes Military Recruitment Process |
International Military - The Indian military is overhauling the recruitment process for personnel below the officer rank. The move is aimed at deploying younger and fitter troops on the front lines. India, which shares a highly militarized border with Pakistan and is embroiled in a high-altitude Himalayan dispute with China, has one of the largest Armed Forces in the world, with about 1.38 million personnel.
Soldiers have been recruited by the Army, Navy and Air Force separately and typically enter service for a term of up to 17 years for the lowest rank. Under the new system, men and women between the ages of 17 and a half and 21 years will be brought into the Armed Forces, many of them for a maximum term of four years.
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According to the Government of India, as many as 46,000 troops will be recruited this year on four-year contracts. Of that number, a quarter are expected to be retained at the end of that term.
"This scheme will strengthen state security and provide opportunities for our youth for military service," Defense Minister Rajnath Singh told reporters in New Delhi, Tuesday (14/6/2022), as quoted by Reuters.
Military officials say the new system, called Agnipath, which means "fireway" in Hindi, will help lower the average age of Armed Forces personnel. "In the Indian army, the largest of its three forces, the average age will drop from 32 to 26," said its leader, General Manoj Pande.
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"A younger profile will help train troops more easily in newer technologies, and their health and fitness levels will be much better," Singh said. He added that employers would benefit from skilled workers once they leave the armed forces.
Meanwhile, it was reported that Indian troops in Kashmir killed two insurgents on Wednesday, one of whom allegedly shot dead a bank manager this month, police said.
India has been battling an Islamic separatist insurgency in Kashmir since the late 1980s. "Indian forces killed two insurgents this morning in a gunfight, one of whom, Jan Mohammad Lone, was involved in the murder of a bank manager," said Vijay Kumar, Kashmir's police chief.
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