Indian Army faces 'shortage' of officers, may cut HQ postings: Report

Indian Army is facing an acute shortage of officers at the Major and Captain levels, reported Indian Express. The news outlet reported that the army is planning to reduce the postings of staff officers at various headquarters in order to overcome the shortage in units. It has also been reported that the army is considering the appointment of re-employed officers to these posts.

Indian Army has reportedly sought inputs from various commands on the proposed move.

As per current procedures within the army, as mid-level officers of the rank of Major complete around six years of service, they are given exposure to staff appointments in different corps command and division headquarters.

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A staff appointment means posting in a headquarterwhere the officer is tasked with responsibilities that have to do with policy and coordination of various subjects. In a unit appointment, an officer is mainly responsible for operations and ground actions.

The shortage

According to the report in Indian Express, there's a shortage of 8,129 officers in the Army. This includes Army Medical Corps and Army Dental Corps. In the Indian Navy and Indian Air Force, the number of officers that are needed is 1,653 and 721, respectively.

In order to tackle the shortage of officers, the army had earlier posted 461 non-empanelled officers to staff appointments wherever possible.

The current proposal reportedly involves cutting down some of the staff appointments in headquarters temporarily until the shortage of officers decreases.

It has reportedly been proposed that junior and mid-level officers currently in staff appointments be posted out once they complete their tenure of 24 months.

The report from the Indian Express has been noted in Indian political circles. Congress president, Mallikarjun Kharge tweeted the news report and accused PM Narendra Modi's government of being disinterested in filling vacancies in the armed forces.

"Modi Govt has all the time to break political parties, but it has NO time to fill in important vacancies in the Armed Forces. Those who trumpet 'Nationalism' on a daily basis have betrayed our Armed Forces like no other," Kharge said in a tweet.

Kharge claimed that the Agnipath scheme is an explicit admission that the Modi government does not have funds for the country's soldiers.

"Modi Government has betrayed the defence community on OROP implementation and created a divide among our brave Jawans by inducing large-scale anomalies in OROP-2. For Modi Government & the BJP, National Security is not a national priority. Only betraying the mandate of the people is their priority," the Congress chief alleged.

(With inputs from agencies)

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