'Agnipath' aims to bring youthfulness, experience to forces, say defence officials

In a joint press meet conducted by officers from all three branches of the armed forces, defence officials said that the aim of the 'Agnipath' scheme was to bring youthfulness and experience to the forces.

Talking to presspersons, Lt. General Arun Puri, additional secretary, department of military affairs said, “Around 17,600 people are taking premature retirement from the three services every year. No one ever tried to ask them what they will do after retirement. This reform was long pending. We want to bring youthfulness and experience with it. Today, a large number of jawans are in their 30s and officers are getting command much later than in the past.”

Puri said that the 'Agniveers' would get the same allowance on par with serving soldiers at present in areas like Siachen and other areas as applicable. He added there are no discrimination against agniveers in service conditions. He added 'Agniveers' will get a compensation of Rs 1 crore if they sacrifice their life in service of the nation.

Puri said that the intake numbers would increase in future years and they have started with 46,000 persons now to analyse the scheme and build infrastructure capacity. “In the next 4-5 years, our intake will be 50-60,000 and it will increase to 90,000- 1 lakh subsequently,” Puri said. He said the intake figures would increase up to 1.25 lakh. Puri claimed that the reservations announced for 'Agniveers' by various ministries and departments were pre-planned and it was not in reaction to the ongoing protests.

Air Marshal SK Jha said the registration process for the first batch to Air Force would begin on June 24 and phase one of online examinations would begin on July 24. He added that the first batch would be enrolled by December this year and their training would begin by December 30.

Vice Admiral Dinesh Tripathi said naval 'Agniveers' would start reaching their training establishment INS Chilka, Odisha from November 21 and it would include both male and female candidates. Lt. General Bansi Ponappa said the first batch of 25,000 'Agniveers' would be inducted by December first week and the second batch by February 2023, increasing it to 40,000.

Responding to a question on the ongoing violence in various states, Puri said they did not anticipate this violence and added there is no place for indiscipline in the armed services. He added aspirants would be required to submit a written pledge that they were not involved in any kind of violence and a police verification would be conducted.