Vishal Thapar / CNN-IBN. Published on Fri, Jan 16, 2009 at 15:50
New Delhi: It was a New Year shocker for the nation — a handful of terrorists holed up in a jungle at Poonch in Jammu and Kashmir held out against a battalion of the Indian Army for a week before slipping past the security cordon early January.
Is the motivation of the Army which has famously done battle from Flanders to Ferozpur finally getting frayed?
"We are of this belief that insurgents, even if they flee once, will return to the same area, to strike in a similar fashion," Chief of Army Staff General Deepak Kapoor said.
As the military challenge to India mounts, the number of men who were ready to stand up and defend India is diminishing.
While on one hand, men in uniform are queuing up to leave, on the other, enlistment at India's military academies is at an all-time low.
The number of officers from the Army's cutting-edge combat leadership wanting to quit has increased four-fold in the last five years.
In 2008, the number jumped up to a record 1,200, most of them high-performers. Not enough money and having to stay away from the family are one of the biggest demoralisers.
"After some time, you want to give the best to your family but where will the money for that come from," Former Army Officer Amar Kwatra said.
But it is the drying up of recruitment academies which has really stunned the defence establishment.
At courses in 2008, there were no takers for two-thirds of the slots at the Indian Military Academy.
Only 86 of the 250 vacancies at the 124th course were subscribed. At the National Defence Academy, cadet intake hit an all-time low of 190 against a training capacity of 300, and after only 11 recruits showed up for a course meant to train 107 engineers at the Officers Training Academy, the course was scrapped.
Got nothing in defence, Army fails to woo talent: IBN Live
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