Indian Army to be re-structured, Rajnath Singh approves major changes
Indian Army: The defense minister Rajnath Singh has put his seal of approval to restructure the Indian Army. This move of overhauling the world’s second-largest Army is expected to make the working of the Indian Army more efficient. The decision to re-structure has been taken based on a detailed internal study which was conducted by the Army Headquarters (AHQ).
Defence Minister Rajnath Singh has approved various proposals aimed at restructuring and reorganizing the Indian Army Headquarters in New Delhi to make the functioning of the service more efficient.
The proposals include setting up separate bodies for a stringent mechanism for human rights and corruption complaints in the armed forces and also moving more than 200 officers from the Army Headquarters to field areas.
The restructuring of the Army Headquarters will be under three broad categories –
- A separate Vigilance Cell
- Umbrella organization to focus on Human rights issues
- Re-location of Army Officers from AHQ to Formations/Units of the Field Army.
In an effort to trim the number of officers posted in the Army Headquarters from the present 1,332 down to 1,203, the Army has freed 206 officers who will be sent to field areas to join the fighting formations and units of the field army.
- Major General – 3 Posts
- Brigadier – 8 Posts
- Colonel – 9 Posts
- Lt. Colonel/Major – 186 Posts
The approval has been given based on a detailed internal study conducted by the Army Headquarters.
TWO SPECIAL VIGILANCE CELLS TO BE SET UP
With an aim to enhance transparency and put in place a more stringent mechanism to look into the corruption and human rights violations in the armed forces, the Ministry of Defence has approved setting up separate bodies to probe allegations of wrongdoings against officials.
Rajnath Singh has given the go-ahead for setting up of these two cells that were part of the military reforms.
1. For corruption – A vigilance cell that will look into complaints of corruption and impropriety will be directly under the Chief of the Army Staff (COAS). An independent vigilance cell will be made functional under the COAS. Presently, the vigilance function for the COAS is through multiple agencies and there is no single point interface, the Ministry of Defence said.
2. For Human Right Violations – To give high priority to the observance of human rights convention and values, it has been decided to set up a special human rights section headed by ADG (major general rank officer) directly under the VCOAS (Vice Chief of the Army Staff). It will be the nodal point to examine any human rights violation reports.