NEW DELHI: The retirement age of jawans in the Army, airmen in the IAF and sailors in the Navy is set to increase.
“We are soon bringing a policy to extend the service profile of the men (forces nomenclature for troops) and have an increased minimum retirement age, said Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) General Bipin Rawat in an exclusive interaction with The Tribune on Tuesday evening.
The move could benefit almost 15 lakh men of the three armed forces.
When asked if he was looking to cut manpower costs as mounting salaries and pensions were taking away a large chunk of the budget, General Rawat said: “I am looking at manpower costs. Why should a jawan serve for just 15 or 17 years, why cannot he serve for 30 years? We are losing trained manpower.”
He allayed fears that this would change the age profile of the fighting force, saying the frontline combatant could be young. “We have an Army Medical Corps, why can’t the nursing assistant serve till 50 years of age?” Citing the example of EME, he said those at base workshops remain there even in war, so why can’t they serve till 50. And at any given time the forces should not have more than a defined number who are above 40 years of age.
Speaking on the impact of Covid, he said the transformation and restructuring that everyone had been discussing was the need of the hour. “There is transformation required in the armed forces and Covid means it will be done now,” General Rawat said. On being asked if the target for having joint commands within three years would be met, General Rawat said: “I don’t visualise this going beyond three years. We will have a structure and implementation will start in three years”.
“For now we are moving ahead with joint Air Defence Command, the IAF chief has given a presentation on the matter and in six months we expect to have things in place. This command will have its own doctrine and amalgamate all training and logistic support.
The next would be the maritime command followed by the joint commands. The Army is doing a study on joint commands and the Navy on maritime commands. “The office of the CDS has given guidelines and studies will be completed by the year-end,” General Rawat said.