Do We REALLY Lack Officers In Indian Armed Forces

Do We REALLY Lack Officers In Indian Armed Forces

Indian Army

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They say that we lack officers in Indian army. Then you are up for it and apply. Then they tell you, you'r are not eligible. I wish they'd make up their minds. 2012 is certainly a bad year for Indian defence aspirants. We have seen so many changes recently in various defence entries like TGC,SSC,AFCAT, Navy etc. So many blunders in deciding eligibility, merit list and recently in publishing correct result. Let's see what all happened.

Before we move further, let me clear that this post in not for criticizing neither for letting any organization down, but to show aspirants how things have changed now. Lets talk about it one by one.

1,129,900 Active personnel, 960,000 Reserve personnel, I seriously doubt we lack officers and army is keep on supporting me with this. 

1. SSC-10th Technical Women Merit list disaster: Army notified some eligible engineering branches in their notice, they have recommended many women candidates from those branches. At the time of merit list they have directly removed those branches and cancelled candidature of recommended candidates. 

Affected Branches:

1. Electrical and Electronics
2. Mining/Construction
3. Industrial Engg & Management/Automobile
4. Electronics and Instrumentation
5. Micro Electronics & Microwave/ Opt Electronics

This is a serious issue which is handled by army very lightly, at least think about candidates, putting branches in notice which do not have sufficient vacancies is sheer negligence and shows poor administration, waste of money and time, for both. With no clear idea about how many female candidates got victimized, but roughly near 30-40.



2. TGC and SSC-Technical Entries: A very popular entry, which is very hard to manage and handle because of uncontrolled population of engineering students in India. Seriously, the most ill managed SSB interviews are for TGC and SSC-tech, candidates went for TGC- Allahabad , Bhopal and Bangalore can understand it very well.

First of all, why army is following this entry, what is the outcome they want from technical entries ? As most of us knows that techies go to technical field or some unit related to technical work like EME etc, but again, do army think how they are going to select suitable candidates?

The answer is NO, because they do not know difference between IT and CSE, and many other streams. They are recruiting candidates based on the alphabets their degree name have, but not the subject they have studied. Why Indian army specifically need CSE students ? do they need their degree name or the subjects they have studied, a CSE student is more like IT student, then on what bases they have decided the vacancies, whether you recruit CSE student or IT student it doesn't matter because both are capable of doing same work. But when you say CSE is eligible then you can not say IT is not eligible, it becomes a Joke, a joke like joinindianarmy.nic.in website. I guess army must have a look at their website condition, total scrap, hope with this they may hire IT students so to fix their website for free and with a better design and navigation. God knows where the whole defence budget goes.

 Recently in TGC-117 they have eliminated 4 more branches, and kept a clear cut statement something like this " No Deviation From Above Qualifications Is Acceptable. Claims Of Course Content/Similar Stream Will Not Be Accepted.". Now you can not argue on this, case close.

What is to be followed:

• Look at IAF, they conduct AFCAT, if you have seen their eligibility criteria for technical entries, they ask you to mark some 8-10 subjects from a set of subjects. If you have studied minimum 8- 10 subjects from a list mentioned subjects, you are in. This shows IAF really want them to do some technical work and this brings them more talented and intelligent officers. Army must follow something like this, just do not put old notifications, just by modifying few branches, do some research on what actually you want. 
• With the present defence budget, army can easily conduct something like AFCAT, twice every year. This is not happening because army really don't need techies, technical entries are happening just for the namesake, it shows there is no actual technical work happens in army or defence, carry on with this and we will forever buy equipment from outside.
• Now if you say forget technical entry and go by CDSE, then, how would a IT student find it easy when  a CSE student is going for a technical entry that too without any written exam.   
• At last, we can not do anything except writing a mail to them or posting something like this.  

Indian Air Force:

1. AFCAT 02/2011 Merit List: IAF is known for its flawless work, also you may find AFSB interviews very convinced. IAF has a record of hiring more candidates in a particular entry, but what about making vacancies for them. Last time in AFCAT 02/2011 there were many candidates got merit out.


85+22+52 =  159 candidates were out, and that too after reserve merit list.

Hope IAF understands the hardwork of aspirants behind this and the dream they have to join IAF. They either recommend in limits or increase vacancies, but not something like this.

Hope best results come in AFCAT 01/2012 merit list.


2. AFCAT 02/2012 Result Failure:  IAF published AFCAT results on time, but after few days they have cancelled the result stating error in published results and mailing system. Now it being more than one month and results are still pending, however mistakes happens but for something like IAF, there is no margin for errors. That is why SSB interviews are hard, no margin for errors, one wrong officer in force and boom. So, IAF must follow something which they look in aspirants. PERIOD.

Navy:

Keeping a high standard since long, apparently navy do not have more vacancies as compare to Army or IAF, but whatever they have, kept at very high standards. Minimum cut off in any navy direct entry goes up to 70%. I have no idea how much fair it is, and what kind of thought process is behind it. We have been taught that officers are judged by OLQs and other things are secondary. So, apparently, Navy  have the best officers when compare to Army and IAF, with boht OLQs and high academic %.

Entries like Tech/Sub are fine but why so high cut off for logistics, Pilot, observer etc.
Hope in the group of more than 70%, Navy is getting good officers because probability goes low when you limit candidates on certain eligibility criteria.

So, dear friends if you want to join Navy but you are a victim of high cut off, then go by raamband "CDSE".

Conclusion:

Hope die hard defence aspirants will make it by hook or by crook, nothing much to conclude on this.


What is your opinion on this, do share your valuable response and comments below, let's discuss more !!

AUTHOR : SSB CRACK