Agnipath: Defence Ministry Announces 10% Reservation for Agniveers; Efforts On to Start Recruitment at the Earliest

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh on Saturday approved a proposal to reserve 10% of the job vacancies in the Ministry of Defence for eligible ‘Agniveers’ who will exit the Agnipath scheme after serving the requisite four-year tenure with the Army, Navy or Air Force.

As per the Defence Ministry, the 10% reservation will be implemented in the Indian Coast Guard and defence civilian posts, and all the 16 Defence Public Sector Undertakings. This reservation would be in addition to the existing reservation for ex-servicemen.

Several ministries and states have proposed to provide Agniveers employment opportunities when they retire after four years. The Defence Ministry’s announcement came after Singh met top defence officials to discuss the finer details of the Agnipath scheme and its implementation.

“Raksha Mantri Shri @rajnathsingh has approved a proposal to reserve 10% of the job vacancies in Ministry of Defence for ‘Agniveers’ meeting requisite eligibility criteria,” the ministry posted on Twitter.

“Necessary amendments to relevant recruitment rules will be undertaken to implement these provisions. Defence Public Sector Undertakings will be advised to make similar amendments to their respective recruitment rules. Necessary age relaxation provision will also be made,” it added.

Sources in the government said it is unlikely there will be further tweaks to the scheme and added that the priority in the current situation will be to start the recruitment process at the earliest since there is anguish among people over no recruitments in the last two years.

“Issuing advertisements and processes will begin within a week. The focus in the present situation will be to ensure the recruitments begin at the earliest,” a government official told News18.

While announcing the Agnipath scheme earlier this week, the government had said that recruitment rallies will begin in 90 days.

The official quoted above said that to address concerns over lack of recruitment in the last two years, the government granted a one-time waiver in the upper age limit for Agnipath scheme by extending it to 23 years from 21 years, adding that any further tweaks are unlikely. The one-time waiver was announced after violent protests erupted in some parts of the country.

As reported by News18 earlier, recruitments under the scheme will progressively increase to around 59,000 in the next four years.

Under the scheme, youth between ages of 17.5 and 21 will be recruited into the three services. They will have a training period of six months. It will be open to men and also to women progressively based on service-specific requirements.

Their enrolment will be based on ‘All India All Class’ basis and they will form a separate rank in the Armed Forces and will carry a distinct insignia.

Soldiers, airmen and sailors will be recruited into the Army, IAF and the Navy under the scheme for a period of four years. Of those to opt to stay on in the services for beyond four years, 25% would be retained.

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