Over 7,000 Officer Vacancies Remain In Army: MoS Ajay Bhatt In Lok Sabha

Over 7,000 officer positions in the Indian Army have been vacant since last year, Ajay Bhatt said, minister of state for defence, in a written response in the Lok Sabha on Monday.

However, Bhatt informed Parliament that the figure had dropped from 7,665 on 1 January 2022 to 7,363 on 15 December 2022.

Bhatt responded to Janata Dal (United) MP Ram Nath Thakur by stating that there are 511 vacancies for military nursing officers as of 15 December up from 471 on 1 January last year. As of 15 December, there were 1,18,485 vacancies for junior commissioned officers/other officers, up from 1,08,685 on 1 January.

Officer vacancies in the Indian Navy increased from 1,557 on 31 December 2021 to 1,653 the following year. Sailor job openings fell from 11,709 on the last day of 2021 to 10,746 at the same time last year.

Vacancies for officers (except medical and dental) in the air force increased from 572 on 1 January 2022 to 761 on 1 December 2022. Airmen vacancies decreased from 6,227 on the first day of 2022 to 2,340 on the last day.

The Indian Army filled 1,512 officer positions in 2021, followed by 1,285 in 2022.

The process of filling vacancies for junior commissioned officers in the army, which was halted in 2021 due to Covid-19, was restarted in 2022 to add 19,065 new officers.

The navy recruited 386 officers in the last year, up from 323 officers in 2021.

Last year, 519 officers were commissioned in the air force, up from 467 in 2021. In 2022, 423 vacancies were filled, compared to 4,609 in 2021.