Military grapples with exodus of officers

NEW DELHI: The global meltdown���s cascading effect may have stemmed it to a certain extent but the fact remains that the armed forces continue to haemorrhage under the onslaught of officers willing to shed their uniforms for the corporate world���s muchgreener pastures.

As many as 6,573 officers from Army, Navy and IAF have sought premature retirement (PMR) in the last five years.
Of them, the majority were of course from the 1.13-million strong Army, several times larger than Navy and IAF, notching a tally of 4,300 officers.

This when, as defence minister A K Antony told Parliament on Wednesday, Army is already short of 11,387 officers, while Navy and IAF grapple with a shortage of 1,512 and 1,400, respectively . Army, incidentally, has an ������ authorised��� ��� strength of 46,614 officers, while it is 12,136 for IAF and 8,797 for Navy. The flurry of showy advertising campaigns, which hard-sell the ������ adventurous��� ��� and ������ honourable��� ��� life in the forces, have obviously also not created much impact. The forces continue to find it extremely difficult to attract enough youngsters with OLQs (officer-like qualities) to their fold.

Though the salaries of armed forces have substantially gone up after the 6th Pay Commission, youngsters still find them poor compared to the private sector, especially for a life which is tough and risky. Poor promotional avenues and frequent transfers which disrupt family life are seen to be the other contributing factors.

The surge for the corporate world can be seen from the fact that the six-month intensive business management courses being held for Service officers in IIMs, XLRIs, MDI (Gurgaon) and Narsee Monjee Institute of Management Studies (Mumbai) are being hugely oversubscribed by mid-career officers, as reported by TOI earlier.

The forces, on their part, have tightened PMR rules to stem the exodus. IAF, for instance, did it after as many as 300 of its pilots left to join civil airliners between 2002 and 2005.

Antony, on his part, said, ������ A number of steps have been taken to motivate the service personnel to continue in service and to attract talented youth to joining the armed forces.������

Enumerating various steps like faster promotions and creation of additional posts at senior ranks, the minister also said, ������ Implementation of the recommendations of the 6th Pay Commission , with substantial improvements in pay structures, will also go a long way in making sthe Services more attractive.������