By Express News Service
NEW DELHI: The special forces of the Indian Armed Forces will now have to wait at least four years to get the fresh elite commandos as keeping the significance of the super specialisation, it can be extended only to those joining as permanent cadre of the Army, Air Force and Navy.
The sources in the services confirmed that the probation period and the advanced training is a specialised one and requires time.
A source in the Navy said, “The policy decision on the induction of the Marine Commandos (Marcos) is a work in progress and only those Agniveers who would complete their four-year tenure and join as permanent cadres will be given the specialized training.”
The Union government recently approved ‘Agnipath’, the new recruitment scheme for the armed forces under which a Agniveer will initially be inducted only for four years. After this tenure, all of the Agniveers will leave the forces and only 25 per cent of those leaving will be re-inducted into the forces on a permanent basis but without pension.
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The probation period alone for the Marcos (Navy special forces) is of nine months, added Navy officers. The selected commandos would train further into specialized streams, he added. The commandos in the Army and IAF are called the Parachute Commandos and Garud Commandos respectively.
To become a part of the elite para commando in the Army, one needs to first cross the rigorous probation period of 90 days. “Post the successful completion of the probation, a soldier is further given training in specialized streams which will depend on the assigned role of that soldier in the unit,” told an officer. Training of a commando never stops, he added. The probation period in case of the Garud Commandos of the Air Force is also quite rigorous and long.
Talking about the Special Forces and their utility, Lt Gen Vinod Bhatia said, “The Special Forces are highly specialized troops which work behind the enemy lines in small numbers to address the high value targets critical to the success of theatre operations.” They keep the enemy troops pinned down, hitting hard at the morale of the enemy, added Lt Gen Bhatia, a former Parachute Regiment officer himself.
