Air Force Chief To Visit Forward Bases, Address Troops On 'Agnipath' Scheme

Indian Air Force chief, Air Chief Marshal VR Chaudhari will be visiting six forward bases on Friday where he would address the troops and discuss the details of the Agnipath entry scheme.

The aim is to explain the details of the scheme to the last man in the force, IAF said in its official statement today.

Notably, the Air Force currently has over 60 air stations all over India. These are grouped into seven commands: Western Air Command at New Delhi, Eastern Air Command at Shillong, Central Air Command at Prayagraj, and Southern Air Command at Thiruvananthapuram (Trivandrum), South Western Air Command at Gandhinagar, Training Command at Bengaluru and Maintenance Command at Nagpur. The largest airbase is in Hindon, Uttar Pradesh.

Indian Air Force on Friday appreciated the government for increasing the upper age limit to 23 from 21 for recruitment under the Agnipath scheme for the year 2022.

In a virtual address, the Indian Air Force chief, Air Chief Marshal VR Chaudhari said, "Happy to announce that the upper age limit (for recruitment) has been revised to 23 years. This will benefit the youth. The recruitment process for Indian Air Force will begin on June 24."

"The Government has announced Agnipath scheme under which youth will be able to join armed forces. The age criteria will be 17.5 to 21 years. Happy to announce that for the first recruitment, the upper age limit has been revised to 23 years. It will benefit the youth. Air Force recruitment will begin on June 24," he said.

Notably, COVID-19 halted the Army's recruitment for over two years. In 2019-2020, the Army recruited jawans and there has been no entry since then. On the other hand, the Indian Navy and the Indian Air Force had both recruited in the last two years respectively.

IAF, via its official Twitter account, wrote, "#IAF welcomes the step to grant a one-time waiver to increase the upper age limit to 23 years for #Agnipath scheme. This will help aspirants whose recruitment was affected due to COVID 19 restrictions. IAF keenly looks forward to inducting #Agniveers. #CAS #VayuSenaKeAgniveer"

Agnipath Scheme was recently launched by the government in an effort to bring a change in the recruitment process of the Armed Forces. With the new military recruitment scheme facing a backlash by Opposition, the Centre has decided to bring a change in the upper age limit for recruiting Agniveers. Granting a one-time waiver, the Centre on June 16, 2022, announced that the Agniveer upper age limit for recruitments via Agnipath Scheme has been extended to 23 years from 21 years.

Consequent to the commencement of the Agnipath scheme, the entry age for all new recruits in the Armed Forces has been fixed as 17 1/2 - 21 years of age, said the Ministry of Defence on Friday.

The Ministry of Defence, in its statement on Tuesday, said that the Agnipath scheme has been designed to enable a youthful profile of the Armed Forces. It will provide an opportunity to the youth who may be keen to don the uniform by attracting young talent from the society who are more in tune with contemporary technological trends and plough back skilled, disciplined and motivated manpower into the society.

It is envisaged that the average age profile of the Indian Armed forces would come down by about 4-5 years by the implementation of this scheme. The nation stands to immensely benefit from the infusion of highly inspired youth with a deeper understanding of self-discipline, diligence and focus who would be adequately skilled and will be able to contribute in other sectors.

This is a major defence policy reform introduced by the Government to usher in a new era in the Human Resource policy of the three Services. The policy, which comes into immediate effect, will hereafter govern the enrolment for the three services.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)