Army veteran Honorary Captain and Param Vir Chakra awardee Captain Bana Singh has criticized the ‘Agnipath’ scheme for recruitment of defense personnel by the Central Government, saying that the country will have to pay a ‘high price’ for this scheme. He said that the army should not be treated like toys.

New Delhi: Army veteran Honorary Captain and the country’s only surviving Param Vir Chakra awardee Shri Bana Singh has said the country will have to “pay a big price” for the Agnipath scheme, which will “ruin” the army and benefit Pakistan and China.

Speaking to the media at his home in Jammu, 73-year-old Singh said, “Agnipath scheme with a four-year contract will ruin the Indian Army.” It should not have been implemented at all.

Known as the ‘Siachen Hero’, Shri Singh led an attack on Pakistan’s Quaid-Azam post at an altitude of over 21,000 feet in June 1987. Six Pakistani soldiers were killed in this attack and the post was captured. After this, the name of the post was changed to ‘Bana Post’.

Shri Bana Singh received the country’s highest gallantry award Param Vir Chakra in 1988 for this bravery. Shri Singh, who retired as a Subedar Major, was given the honorary rank of Captain. It is noteworthy that a tweet from Capt. Bana Singh’s Twitter handle criticizing the Agnipath scheme had created a stir on social media. He said, ‘Then I started getting calls, after which it was removed.’ He says that he will continue to speak his mind, ‘I will always speak for the army and its good.’

Capt. Singh compared the way the Agnipath plan was imposed on everyone with ‘dictatorship’. “Decisions involving such a radical change in democracy cannot be taken without consulting all stakeholders and military veterans who know a lot about soldiers as they have fought wars on the ground,” he said. This has never happened before.

Capt. Singh said, ‘It is like a dictatorship that is, someone just says ‘I have taken a decision and it has to be implemented’. Whose stick is like his buffalo.

Significantly, on June 14, the Central Government, in a radical change in the decades-old defense recruitment process, had announced the Agnipath scheme for recruitment of soldiers in the Army, Navy and Air Force, under which the recruitment of soldiers was only for a short period of four years that will be done on contract basis.

Under the scheme, about 46,000 soldiers will be recruited in the three services this year. Under the scheme, youth in the age group of 17.5 years to 21 years will be recruited in the army for four years and 25 percent of them will be kept in the army for the next 15 years.

Later, the government increased the maximum age limit for recruitment to 23 years in 2022. The recruits recruited under this new scheme will be called ‘Agniveers’.

The monthly salary of an ‘Agniveer’ in the first year of employment under the Agnipathscheme would be Rs. 30,000, but only Rs. 21,000 would be in hand. Every month 9,000 rupees will go to a fund of the government, in which the government will also put the same amount on its behalf. After this, the monthly salary in the second, third and fourth year will be Rs. 33,000, Rs. 36,500 and Rs. 40,000. Each ‘Agniveer’ will get an amount of Rs. 11.71 lakh as ‘Service Fund Package’ and will be exempted from income tax.

This recruitment will be done on ‘All India, All Category’ basis. This will change the composition of many regiments that recruit youth from communities such as Rajputs, Jats and Sikhs, apart from recruiting from specific areas.

Based on the organizational requirement and policies of the Army as declared by the Armed Forces from time-to-time, ‘Agniveer’ will be provided an opportunity to apply for permanent enrolment in the Armed Forces on completion of four years of service.

Youths seeking jobs in the army are protesting across the country saying that recruitment under this scheme will render them unemployed after four years. Retired generals have also said that the scheme will harm the nature, professionalism and morale of the armed forces.

In a post made by Capt. Singh’s Twitter handle, it was said, ‘Save the country, Agnipath scheme will harm us badly. India is passing through a critical phase. Youth are the future of our motherland.’ There was a lot of discussion on this tweet regarding the criticism of the plan on social media. Several military veterans thanked Capt. Singh for speaking on the subject. However, the tweet was deleted on Wednesday morning.

Congress leader Shri Rahul Gandhi also targeted the central government while sharing the news of a newspaper with Bana Singh’s tweet.

Shri Rahul Gandhi wrote on June 24, 2022, on Twitter, ‘On one side there is Paramvir of the country and on the other side the pride and dictatorship of the Prime Minister. Will only ‘friends’ be heard in ‘New India’, not the heroes of the country?’

The government has defended the plan, saying it was meant to lower the average age in the forces and that military officials had been thinking of such measures since the 1980s. Capt. Singh said that India’s enemies can benefit from the Agnipath scheme. He said, ‘Being a soldier is not a sport, it comes with years of training. What kind of training will they get in six months?’ “It doesn’t matter what a person (they) says. The whole country should say this. The country will have to pay a big price for this (Agnipath scheme).

He added, “Those who have taken the decision of the scheme have no idea about the armed forces. The army cannot be treated like toys. Neighbouring countries like China and Pakistan will take advantage of this. Chinese troops will infiltrate our areas further.”

It is noteworthy that in June 1987, the 8th Jammu and Kashmir Light Infantry stationed in Siachen had found that a large number of Pakistani soldiers had infiltrated the glacier. Getting them out was a necessary but difficult task, so a special task force was formed. Then Singh who was then a Naib Subedar volunteered to join it.

The enemy post was almost like an impregnable glacier fortress with 457 meters high ice walls on either side. This gave the Pakistanis the strategic advantage of keeping a clear watch on the glacier from an altitude of 21,000 feet 5,000 feet above the Indian Army battalion headquarters in the area. Singh had led the party and reached there crawling and surrounded the enemy.

Capt. Singh is invited every year as a special guest in the Republic Day Parade and Army Day celebrations as a role model for the Army.

News Courtesy: The Telegraph