Whether a large number of officers and soldiers of the army are going to retire from the service in the next five years

GOVERNMENT OF INDIA

MINISTRY OF DEFENCE

LOK SABHA

ANSWERED ON  28.11.2014

(a) whether the Government is aware that a large number of officers and soldiers of the army are going to retire from the service in the next five years; 

(b) if so the number of posts likely to be vacated; 

(c) the number of sanctioned and vacant posts vis-a-vis the recruitment of the army at present; 

(d) whether the Government has prepared any action plan to fill the vacancies in time; and 

(e) if so, the details thereof?

(a) & (b): Retirement of officers and Junior Commissioned Officers (JCOs) / Other Ranks (ORs) in Army is a continuous process. It is not feasible to accurately predict the number of posts to be vacated in the next five years on account of increasing of retirement age with promotion to the next rank, difficulty in predicting number of officers and JCOs / ORs picking up next rank, uncertainty in the number of personnel seeking premature retirement and number of officers and JCOs / ORs likely to be discharged on medical / disciplinary grounds. However, approximately 40,000 JCOs / ORs and 900 Officers retire annually. 

(c) In the officers cadre (excluding Army Medical Corps, Army Dental Corps and Military Nursing Service), out of the authorized strength of 47,574 the present strength of officers is 39,585. Approximately 2500 officers are recruited every year through various entries. 

In case of JCOs / ORs, the authorized strength is 11,64,738 and present strength is 11,37,810. There is no deficiency in JCOs / ORs as the number of recruits under training are more than the vacancies at any given point of time. 

(d) & (e): Timely action for filling up of vacancies arising from time to time is an ongoing process. Further, to address the issue of cumulative shortage of officers in the Army, a number of steps have been taken which include making the service more attractive by way of reduction in time required for promotions, introduction of Colonel (Time Scale) rank, upgradation of posts in Select Ranks for enhancing promotional avenues increasing the tenure of Short Service Commissioned Officers (SSCOs) from 10 years to 14 years, sanction of additional Service Selection Boards (SSBs) for increasing selection rate of officers, augmentation of pre-commissioning training facilities, implementation of recommendations of the VI Central Pay Commission with improvements in the pay structure of officers of Armed Forces etc. 

Further, Armed Forces have undertaken sustained image projection and publicity campaign to create awareness among the youth on the advantages of taking up a challenging and satisfying career. Awareness campaigns, participation in career fairs and exhibitions, advertisements in print and electronic media, motivational lectures in schools, colleges are some of the other measures in this direction. 

Source: Loksabha.nic.in