Showing posts with label INDIAN - ARMY MAN MANAGEMENT. Show all posts

Monday, June 6, 2016

MAN MANAGEMENT::Reducing Flab in Armed Forces

SOURCE:
http://www.tribuneindia.com/news/comment/reducing-flab-in-armed-forces/247339.html

Related :

http://bcvasundhra.blogspot.in/2016/06/blog-post.html

Reducing Flab in Armed Forces

By

Gen V P MALIK( retd)

                   MODERNISATION
                                      &
    EXPANSION CAN'T GO TOGETHER

Jun 6, 2016.

The Indian army today is the third largest in the world with over 38,000 officers and 11.38 lakh soldiers

Jun 6, 2016

Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar has set up a 12-member committee headed by Lieut-Gen DB Shekatkar (retd) to suggest structural changes in the Army, the IAF and the Navy on cutting down flab and reducing revenue (maintenance) expenditure. Its recommendations will entail doing away with posts that may have become redundant due to technology, and to ensure that addition of new equipment (modernisation) does not mean a corresponding rise in the personnel strength of the forces.

Parrikar has two important reasons for ordering this study. One is the ever-increasing revenue expenditure on manpower which leaves less than 20 per cent of the defence budget for weapons and equipment modernisation. The other is the advice from Prime Minister Narendra Modi. In his address at the Combined Commanders' Conference in December 2015, Modi had said, “At a time when major powers are reducing their forces and rely more on technology, we are still constantly seeking to expand the size of our forces. Modernisation and expansion of forces at the same time is a difficult and unnecessary goal.” Articulating global, regional and national strategic environment and politico-military concerns, the Prime Minister exhorted the Defence Minister and the military commanders to promote "jointness" across every level, shorten the tooth-to-tail ratio, and re-examine assumptions that keep massive funds locked up in inventories.

There is no doubt that budgetary constraint is the primary reason for this decision. As a percentage of the GDP, the defence budget has been decreasing over the last decade. This year there was an increase of 1.16 per cent on the basis of the budget estimate of FY 2015-16. Calculated against the revised estimates (Rs 18,295 crore was surrendered by the Ministry of Defence), it works to an increase of 9 per cent.

This allocation does not cover the rate of inflation, fall in the value of the rupee against the dollar, and the sharply increasing cost of weapons and equipment all over the world.

Due to the “One Rank, One Pension” scheme, the pension bill will increase substantially. With implementation of the Seventh Pay Commission recommendations, salaries, allowances and establishment charges of all civil and military personnel, paid from the defence budget, will shoot up. Recently, Defence Secretary G. Mohan Kumar admitted to the Standing Committee on Defence that “India’s military spending for FY 2016-17 is not as per the requirements of the services.” Unless the government hikes the defence budget, which is very unlikely, the Ministry of Defence would face a serious resource crunch to make up huge deficiencies of weapons, equipment and ammunition. Any force modernisation will remain a dream.

We faced a similar situation in the late 1990s. As Army Chief, I decided to suppress 50,000 manpower (mostly from non-field force) over a period of three years, provided the money saved would be given to the army for capital purchases. D B Shekatkar, then a Major-General, heading Perspective Planning Directorate, worked on details in consultation with the heads of arms and services, principal staff officers and army commanders. There was considerable opposition within the army and outside. After obtaining approval and a written commitment on the savings from the Cabinet Committee on Security, we implemented the scheme for two years.

The Kargil war put an end to that scheme in its third year.

The Indian army today is the third largest in the world with over 38,000 officers (sanctioned strength is 49,631 officers) and 11.38 lakh soldiers. Cadre reviews and implementation of the Ajai Vikram Singh report has made it top-heavy with bloated headquarters. This is definitely not in line with modern defence management to win short and swift wars.

Incidentally, India is not alone in its attempt to trim its armed forces and improve the teeth-to-tail ratio. In the last decade, all major armed forces of the world have attempted such exercises and made deep cuts in manpower — the most important and costliest military resource. In 2012, the UK announced a 20 per cent cut, reducing the strength of its army to 82,000 combatants by the end of this decade. The Russian army has done away with large size divisional headquarters to make itself a quick-strike, lean force. The US army has announced a reduction of strength by a whopping 80,000 by 2017 to “reduce the overall number of headquarters, while sustaining as much combat capabilities as possible.” China’s recently announced military reforms envisage a cut of 300,000 personnel in its 2.3 million PLA forces by 2020. The idea is to “remake the PLA from a manpower intensive force to a smaller, technologically able and mobile force capable of combat beyond its geographical borders.”

Over the last decade, India's armed forces have absorbed a fair amount of technological developments, including communications and digitisation. Manpower intake is better educated, savvy on computers and smart phones. Most of them have driving licences. But the resultant organisational changes, shedding of redundant establishments and manpower savings have seldom been attempted by the army. On many of these issues, there is a lot to be learnt from the best practices of the private sector.

In the past, many units were raised to meet special operational circumstances of that period e.g. Rashtriya Rifles for Punjab. A review to examine the need or quantum of such forces is overdue.

Meanwhile, there is considerable scope for downsizing forces in areas which are not of operational importance, and to reduce the flab. Some suggestions which require further study are:

By further improving jointness amongst the forces, there is scope to cut down duplication (sometime triplication) of logistic (medical, supplies, station duties) and security resources.

Reducing size of headquarters, particularly of field formations, training establishments and shedding redundant establishments.

Merger and pruning of logistic units and training facilities of the army like the EME, Ordnance, Army Service Corps, Army Education Corps, and so on.

Clubbing of non-essential unit functions such as Military Farms and Army Postal Service, or outsourcing their functions.

A review of all peace establishments.

Multiple use of lands/facilities wherever units and formations are in close proximity to each other.

With the development of the automobile sector and availability of civilian repair and maintenance infrastructure in forward areas, this requirement of the armed forces fleet can be outsourced, or even better, contracted with vehicle manufacturers.

The flab is not only within the military. Civilian organisations like the ordnance factories, defence PSUs, DRDO, the MES, the Defence Estate, and the Armed Forces Headquarters Civil Services, paid from the defence budget, also need to be trimmed. With the Indian private sector coming of age and contributing more for the defence, and greater opportunity to outsource services, these organisations should be included in the flab reduction exercise.

Friday, December 4, 2015

ADM & MORALE (POLICY) :: MAN MANAGEMENT - Don't Divide the Army, Mr Parrikar

SOURCE :
http://www.business-standard.com/article/opinion/ajai-shukla-don-t-divide-the-army-mr-parrikar-115033000986_1.html

Ajai Shukla:

Don't Divide the Army,

Mr Parrikar

Internal simmering in the army has come to a boil after the govt tries to retain a discriminatory promotions policy

Ajai Shukla

March 30, 2015

Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar has badly flubbed his first major decision relating to the morale and cohesiveness of the Indian Army. After the Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT) - the military's departmental tribunal - wisely struck down a discriminatory army promotion policy, Mr Parrikar's ministry has appealed in the Supreme Court. Instead of welcoming the AFT's righting of a bitterly resented wrong, Mr Parrikar has backed the divisive notion that some branches of the army are superior to others; and these should be favoured with extraordinary promotion quotas and vacancies rather than going by merit alone.

In its landmark verdict on March 2, the AFT ruled that promotions to the pivotal rank of colonel (that is, commanding officers of units) are unfairly biased in favour of two army branches: the infantry and the artillery. The tribunal held that "discriminatory" army promotion guidelines of 2009 denied "equal opportunity of promotion to all officers of all corps of Indian Army", and ordered the reconvening of all promotion boards to the rank of colonel held since 2008. In this review, vacancies would be equitably allocated to arms and services, based on "pro rata" calculation of their actual officer strength.

Since 2009, a disproportionate share of colonel vacancies has made it possible for 60 per cent of infantry and artillery lieutenant colonels to become colonels, while officers from other arms and services have a success rate as low as 26 per cent. Worse, this injustice gets extended to the higher ranks of brigadier and general, where the vacancies for each arm or service corresponds to the number of colonels it has.
Mr Parrikar's worrying lack of judgement lies not just in his failure to see this injustice, but also in the divisive argument that his appeal is based on. Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi told the Supreme Court that the infantry alone "faces the bullets". Unashamedly scaremongering, he argued for faster infantry promotions because the Pakistani army has younger infantry commanders. Mr Rohatgi forgets that India's "older" commanders have won every war with Pakistan.

Mr Parrikar should remember his army fights as an integrated whole, not as gladiatorial infantrymen supported by lesser arms and services. Infantry units in counter-insurgency roles are officered to a major degree by young officers on deputation from other arms and services. The AFT judgment notes that their combat performance often surpasses that of infantry and artillery officers. In actual war, rapidly shifting front lines and long-range, precision strike weaponry make the battlefield hazardous not just for infantry and artillery, but equally for engineering support, communications, repair and recovery of combat equipment, and logistic support like supplying ammunition, fuel and supplies. There are few tasks more hazardous than those performed by combat engineers, which clear minefields under enemy fire. It was for this that Prem Bhagat - an engineer, not an infantryman - became the first Indian officer to win the legendary Victoria Cross. Every Indian soldier knows this, even if Mr Parrikar does not.

Yet how can the defence minister understand the danger of dividing officers along lines of promotion self-interest, when the army's own generals apparently do not. The current dispute began when a dominant cabal of infantry and artillery army commanders and army chiefs from 2001 to 2009 cynically subverted the recommendations of two high-powered committees - theKargil Review Committee (KRC) and the Ajai Vikram Singh Committee (AVSC) - which recommended ways of reducing the age profile of the Indian army.

In 1999, the KRC - benefiting from the wisdom of K Subrahmanyam and George Verghese - advocated lowering age across the army, not just for officers. Instead of recruiting soldiers for 17 years (the practice since 1976), after which they are entitled to a pension for life, the KRC recommended recruiting soldiers for just seven-10 years, after which they could be sidestepped into paramilitary forces or the police. This remains unimplemented due to home ministry opposition.

In 2001, the AVSC suggested ways of reducing the ages of officers at every rank and in every arm/service - not just within the infantry and the artillery. To quickly promote younger officers, the AVSC authorised additional army vacancies at senior ranks - 1,484 additional colonels; 222 more brigadiers; 75 new major generals; and 20 additional lieutenant generals. This aimed at reducing the age of commanding officers (colonels) by five years to 36-37 years, of brigadiers by six years to 44-45 years and major generals would command divisions when they were 51-52 years old, three years younger than before.

Simultaneously, the AVSC recommended a longer-term solution to the problem of a prohibitively steep promotion pyramid. This involved taking in more "short service commission" officers, who mostly retire after serving five years. For those five years, they provide the army the lieutenants and the captains it needs, without staying on to compete for vacancies at senior ranks.

From 2001 to 2009, the AVSC's short-term recommendations were perverted by four successive army chiefs - two each from the infantry and the artillery - who distributed most of the newly authorised rank vacancies to their own arms through a policy called "Command Exit Model", rammed through on January 21, 2009. This pretended that the AVSC aimed at reducing ages in the infantry and the artillery, and presented a fallacious logic for allocating additional colonel vacancies to the two favoured arms. The infantry was effectively handed 110 colonel vacancies to command battalions of the Rashtriya Rifles (RR) and the Assam Rifles (AR), in addition to 350 infantry battalions. Although officers from every arm/service man the AR and the RR battalions, exclusionary conditions were framed to make it almost impossible for non-infantry officers to command these units. The infantry, thus, increased its colonel vacancies by 30 per cent (from 350 to 460).

To compound this advantage, it was decided that infantry colonels would command for just two and a half years. With 460 infantry colonels needed every two and a half years, that meant 184 colonel vacancies each year. In contrast, the engineers and signals were arbitrarily given command tenures of four years, and the logistics services of five years; reducing the number of colonels they needed each year.

With an artillery chief, general Deepak Kapoor, heading the army in 2009, the artillery was similarly favoured. Small "light batteries", traditionally commanded by lieutenant colonels, were elevated to "light regiments" commanded by colonels. The artillery's command tenure was shortened from three and a half years to just three years.

Internal simmering within the army has boiled over after the AFT judgment. Initially just five-six officers went to the AFT, but now dozens are approaching the Supreme Court, adding their combined weight to the moral force of the AFT judgment. Mr Parrikar is cornered, after having briefly appeared enlightened earlier this year, when he promised the defence ministry would end its habit of fruitless appeals against adverse court verdicts. He seems likely to be rudely shocked when the Supreme Court rules on April 15

Wednesday, November 25, 2015

MAN - MANAGEMENT :: CHAIN OF ARMY SUCCESSION

[Whispers in the Corridors]

MAN - MANAGEMENT :
: CHAIN OF ARMY SUCCESSION

TOP APPOINTMENTS OF ARMY LIKELY TO BE ANNOUNCED SOON
CHAIN OF SUCCESSION CLEAR AS MODI GOVT SET TO FOLLOW SENIORITY PRINCIPLE

As per highly placed sources in the cabinet committee on appointments, top slots of commanders in chief in the army are to be announced soon. The Modi Govt has made it very clear that it will not disturb the laid down seniority principle for these appointments and the senior most eligible officers will be promoted, as has been the past precedence for many years. Three officers, Bipin Rawat, BS Negi and Sarath Chand have been cleared to be top commanders in chief in the army. All three are from the infantry stream.
Bipin Rawat and BS Negi are from the 1978 batch, and are set to be given army commander status as several army commanders are retiring in the coming months. Rajan Bakhshi the top army man in Lucknow is retiring on Nov 30 and on Jan 31 next year, two more army commanders viz Arun Sahni and Ashok Singh will be hanging up their boots on the same day, making way for two more slots. With this in mind, the committee has also cleared Sarath Chand, of 1979 batch to take on the top appointment.
Sarath Chand thus becomes the first officer from 1979 batch who will be given Army Commander status (in next February). The most interesting aspect of the Govt thought process is that it has decided to abide strictly by the seniority principle to avoid any unnecessary controversies. Sources say that the Modi Govt will not be violating the seniority principle for armed forces appointments. This means that the chain of succession for future commanders in chief is also clear. This is the famous chain of succession that, as per VK Singh, was manipulated in a conspiracy hatched by JJ Singh to ensure that his protégé Bikram Singh became arrmy chief. This was done by the date of birth episode of VK Singh, else he would have gone on to serve for an extra ten months paving way for SR Ghosh to get to the top and Bikram Singh would not have become chief.
With the Govt set to follow the seniority principle, next year, in 2016, there will be four more officers stepping up to the topmost army hierarchy. On Jul 31 on retirement of KJ Singh, another cavalry officer DR Soni of 1979 batch will be granted status of army commander. A month later on Aug 31, the number two in army hierarchy MMS Rai will hang up his boots paving way for 1979 batch officer Surinder Singh of mechanised infantry branch to be granted army commander status (whilst someone from amongst the other army commanders will be moved to Delhi to replace Rai.)
Two months later on 30 Nov 2016 the army’s top man in J&K, DS Hooda, will retire and this will enable the first army officer from 1980 batch to step up to status of army commander. As per seniority principle Hoodas replacement will be 1980 batch Devraj Anbu, a man of the infantry branch.
At the end of next year, on new years eve, Dalbir Singh Suhaag will bid aideu to the uniform and Praveen Bakshi a cavalry man presently in Calcutta will take over the 1.2 million strong force. Stepping in to fill his slot will be Abhay Krishna from infantry stream who will become the second officer from the 1980 batch to reach the coveted status.
Interestingly when Praveen Bakshi hangs up his uniform on 31 Jul 2019, it will be Devraj Anbu coming to Delhi to replace him as chief. Anbu will thus become the third officer from sikh light infantry branch to reach the very top after VP Malik and Bikram Singh.
In sharp contrast to 2016, in the year 2017 there will only be one top slot falling vacant when mechanised infantry branch officer PM Hariz hangs up his boots on 30 Nov 2017. Replacing him will be another man from sikh light infantry MM Naravane once again from 1980 batch. The 1980 army batch will be able to have its fourth officer, R Chopra, also from infantry stream, who will be able to achieve army commander status when he replaces Bipin Rawat on 31 Mar 2018.
The the chain of succession currently ends at 1980 batch (and at March 2018) because officers from 1981 batch are still major generals and it is only once the lieut generals from amongst them emerge that the seniority principle will get applied further.
Dr. Suresh Mehrotra
Editor-in-Chief, Whispers in the Corridors
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