Agnipath | Short-service soldiers - a necessary reform for India to retain strategic autonomy

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A lot of young people are very upset with Agnipath, the government’s new scheme of short-service recruitment to the armed forces. This reflects the crisis in the market for jobs, and the difficulty people have securing decent work.

Conversion of what has traditionally been seen as a secure, honourable job for life, complete with an inflation-adjusted government pension, and a long working life after retirement, into a short stint of service that leaves you, at the end of it, with all the insecurities of finding a new job is bound to raise hackles. But this kind of reform is essential for India to modernise its armed forces, and spend more money on sophisticated weapons and logistics than on pensions. It is to be hoped that the government would stand its ground, instead of backing down in the face of protests.

The experience of China’s People’s Liberation Army is instructive. The total strength of the PLA, including reserves and the paramilitary, was 11.63 million in 1980. This came down to 3.045 million by 2020 (An Observer Research Foundation occasional paper on China’s military modernisation is a ready reference). The strength of the army, the navy, and the air force came down, even as new military arms such as the Coast Guard, Strategic Support Forces and Strategic Rocket Force were added, with net additions of personnel.

Defence spending in China has remained constant as a share of GDP, at around 1.7 percent, and it has come down as a share of total government spending, as the government acquired the ability to mobilise a larger share of GDP to meet its expenditure requirement.

This, of course, would be part obfuscation: some research and development with distinct military objectives would slip under Budget heads for space, cyber security, quantum computing, communications, etc. But this would be true of all defence budgets around the world. Foreign observers put China’s defence spending at over $270 billion, while they estimate India’s military spending to be $67 billion.

Divisions such as PLA Strategic Support Force and PLA Rocket Force claim increasing shares of the defence budget. Strategic Support Forces house cyber, quantum computing, encryption, and communication capabilities, besides unconventional capabilities including psychological warfare, and disinformation.

The army’s share of the defence budget dropped below 50 percent for the first time in 2018, while the shares of navy, air force, the SSF and the RF went up.

With tax revenues of only 17 percent of GDP for the Centre and the states combined, there are serious limits on how much India can spend additionally on defence. At the same time, to uphold India’s goal of strategic autonomy in a world of big powers, growing military budgets, and rival alliances, India needs to have a critical minimum strategic capability, with indigenous R&D at the core, to produce advanced weapons systems domestically, to create quality jobs, and intellectual property — all at low cost. That means reallocation of the existing defence budget, shifting focus from men to arms, improving the tooth-to-tail ratio, in the jargon.

Having soldiers serve only short stints, even as career officers spend longer periods, has distinct advantages. The armed forces can serve as a gateway to subsidised higher education for young people from disprivileged socio-economic backgrounds.

While they serve in the army, they will acquire skills that can be quantified as credits that count for a degree later on. They will get a decent stipend. They will serve as a young fighting force, constantly renewed as young people move in and out with regularity.

The current Agnipath scheme could do with some improvements. Instead of docking some 30 percent of their pay as forced saving by individual recruits, the government should enrol them in the National Pension System, just like normal civil servants.

The ideal solution to the One Rank-One Pension controversy is to make all pensions contributory, with a top-up to beat inflation, as Britain has done with its latest armed forces pension scheme. Instead of a pension while leaving the service after four years, young veterans would have an initial corpus in their pension pot, to which they would keep adding, over the years of their work life.

However, at the end of their stint in the armed forces, young veterans should be given government scholarships, not loans, to let them complete a basic degree of their choice at whichever place they gain admission to. This would incentivise the recruits to prepare well for a future career, when they are not on a tour of duty in areas of active hostility.

It is not clear why the government wants to retain 25 percent of the recruits for 15 years. Some junior commissioned officers might be required, but most of the leadership should come from officers, in whose recruitment, the short service soldier veterans would and should have an edge.

Over the years, the Budget would be spared the burden of pensions for soldiers. Officers’ pension should also be contributory, with a top-up alone from the Budget. The saving can be utilised for modern materiel.

This is not some unique Indian reform. This is how most armies function. In the US Army, a soldier enlists for four years, and remains as a reserve resource for four more years.

In Israel and South Korea, conscription is the rule. Young Israelis spend 30-32 months in service and move on, some of them founding startups that find global markets for assorted security-related kit or services, inspired by their first-hand knowledge of how the armed forces work and struggle.

Some worry that four years are too short a period within which to recoup the resources spent on training new recruits. Other countries do not find this a worry. The training will come in handy if it becomes necessary to call upon reserves in an emergency.

It is essential to release veterans into the workforce early on, so that they can complete their education, and join the workforce more or less on par with their civilian counterparts. Intangible benefits of military training, such as focus, teamwork, and perseverance will work to the advantage of young veterans, apart from simple skills such as driving a vehicle or reading a map.

If India maintains the status quo on defence recruitment, its armed forces would remain flabby, pre-modern, and sorely behind those of strategic rivals. The only question is, does the government have the stomach to stand its ground in the face of public anger.