New Delhi: The three military services — army, navy and the air force — on Sunday announced the broad schedule for recruitment of soldiers under the new scheme, Agnipath while asserting that it is being implemented to bring down the age profile of armed forces. Strongly defending the scheme, Lieutenant General Anil Puri, additional secretary in the Department of Military Affairs, said that reduction in the age profile in the three services had been on the table for quite some time and the Kargil review committee had also made observations on the same.
For induction of Agniveers in the navy, the naval headquarters will come up with a broad guideline for the recruitment by June 25, said Vice Admiral Dinesh Tripathi. First batch of the recruits will join the training programme by November 21, Tripathi added.
He further said that both men and women will be recruited under the scheme.
Giving details about Air Force’s plan to induct recruits under the scheme, Air Marshall S K Jha said that the process of registration will begin on June 24 the process of online examination for phase one of the recruitment will start on July 24.
"We are planning to start the training for the first batch of recruits by December 30," Air Marshall Jha said.
Announcing Army’s plan for induction of soldiers under the scheme, Lieutenant General Bansi Ponappa said that the Army will come up with a draft notification on Monday and subsequent notifications will be issued by various recruitment units of the force from July 1 onwards.
Recruitment rallies under the Agnipath scheme will take place across India in August, September and October, he said.
The first batch comprising 25,000 personnel will join the training programme in the first and second week of December. The second lot of recruits will join their training around February 23, Lt Gen Ponappa added.
He said a total of 83 recruitment rallies will be organised across the country to select around 40,000 personnel.