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All stakeholders agreed on Agnipath scheme, says Army chief
Naravane’s remarks on the scheme figured in the recently published excerpts of his yet-to-be released autobiography titled Four Stars of Destiny
The Agnipath scheme for short-term induction of soldiers was finalised after extensive consultations, army chief General Manoj Pande said on Thursday, in comments that come weeks after his predecessor General Manoj Mukund Naravane created a stir by revealing that the Agnipath scheme caught the army by surprise and was a bolt out of the blue for the air force and the navy.
“It will be unfair for me to say anything on the comments by my predecessor,” Pande said during his customary annual media briefing ahead of the Army Day on January 15. “But I just wish to reiterate here that the final framework, structure of the Agnipath scheme came about after an iterative process, after consultations. It took into account whatever issues we had to put across,” he said in response to a question on Naravane’s take on the scheme.
Naravane’s remarks on the scheme figured in the recently published excerpts of his yet-to-be released autobiography titled Four Stars of Destiny. The excerpts of the memoirs, reviewed by news agency PTI, revealed that Naravane sounded out the Prime Minister about the “tour of duty” scheme for the short-term induction of soldiers in the army in early 2020, but months later the PMO came out with a formulation with a wider scope to include all the three services. He has written in the book that the army’s initial view was that 75% of the personnel to be recruited could be retained while 25% should be released.
On Thursday, Pande also added that the army has received positive feedback on Agniveers, as soldiers recruited under the Agnipath model are termed.
“From here on we need to move forward and like I said the acceptability, the positivity, the ownership (of the scheme) ...The integration of the Agniveers in the units is happening well,” Pande said.
The Agnipath model marked a major departure from the military’s decades-old recruitment system that was discontinued when the government announced the new scheme in June 2022. It seeks to recruit soldiers for only four years, with a provision to retain 25% of them in regular service.
There are a few challenges in terms of training, but most of these are at the tactical level, Pande said.
“These entail tweaking of our policies in terms of how you deal with the limited training period.... or, harmonising the physical and firing standards between the Agniveers and the regular soldiers. These issues are more in the realm of management... pay and allowances..., and as we move forward, we are picking these issues up based on the feedback,” the army chief added.
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Prime Minister Narendra Modi last year described the Agnipath scheme as a “transformative policy” that would be a “game-changer” in strengthening the military and making it ready for future challenges, while stressing that Agniveers recruited under the new model will make the armed forces “more youthful and tech-savvy”.
India, on June 14, 2022, announced the Agnipath scheme replacing the legacy system to lower the age profile of the armed forces, ensure a fitter military and create a technically skilled war fighting force capable of meeting future challenges. It sparked widespread protests and forced a concerted outreach by the government to scotch apprehensions about the scheme.
Agniveers will draw an annual salary of ₹4.76 lakh in the first year of service and ₹6.92 lakh in the fourth, will get a non-contributory insurance cover of ₹48 lakh, and an additional ex gratia payment of ₹44 lakh for death attributable to service. Those released after four years will get ₹11.71 lakh as Seva Nidhi severance package, including ₹5.02 lakh contributed by them during their service. They will also have job quotas in different government organisations, paramilitary forces and other departments.
Naravane has written in his memoirs that the government was proposing a salary of ₹20,000 (a month) for Agniveers in the first year of service.
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“This was just not acceptable. Here, we were talking about a trained soldier who was expected to lay down his life for the country. Surely a soldier could not be compared with a daily wage labourer? Based on our very strong recommendations, this was later raised to ₹30,000 per month,” he has written.
The Agnipath scheme is still work in progress, said former Northern Army commander Lieutenant General DS Hooda (retd).
“Lessons will be learned along the way. These would be taken into consideration as the scheme moves forward and the government should be open to certain modifications,” he added.
