To rebalance expenditure, MoD to change appointment pattern

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, August 29

The Ministry of Defence has moved to change the pattern for appointing military and civilian officers on important administrative posts at the armed forces headquarters.

A high-level committee has been set up to identify which posts at the administrative level required only employees with military experience.

This is in line with the recommendations of a committee of experts to enhance combat capability and re-balance defence expenditure of the forces. The other aspect studied by the panel was utilisation of civilian employees posted at the armed forces headquarters (AFHQ).

Panel to decide…

• Which administrative posts are occupied by civilian staff, but require military field experience
• Will interact with branches of services’ HQ, inter-service organisations
• Will collate data on authorised & actual strength of AFHQ in respective services

Union Defence Minister Rajnath Singh has okayed setting up of the committee headed by Lt Gen DB Shekatkar (retd). Two other members on the panel are R Chandrashekhar, a former AFHQ cadre officer, and AN Das from the MoD finance wing.

The committee will conduct a study and identify such appointments in the three services that may be within the domain of the AFHQ civilian staff. It will also identify posts at the headquarters where civilian officers had been posted despite the positions requiring only those with strict military field experience.

The panel has been tasked to interact with various branches and directorates of the services’ headquarters of the MoD and the inter-service organisations for undertaking the study and submit a report of its recommendations by the first week of October.

The scope of the study will be to collate data on authorised and actual strength of the AFHQ officers in the respective services.

It will also collect data on brigadier-level officers of the armed forces posted in the administration, finance, policy formulation, coordination, personnel management, training, vigilance, legal wings and land and works.