The Indian Navy is reeling under a shortage of 10,896 personnel including 1,777 officers, according to details provided by the defence ministry in Parliament on.

Navy Has Shortage Of 10,896 Personnel

Responding to a question in Lok Sabha, Minister of State for Defence Ajay Bhatt also said 9,119 posts of sailors are lying vacant in the Navy as on October 31. He said the shortage in the officer-rank is 1,777.

The sanctioned strength of officers and sailors in the Navy is 11,979 and 76,649. Bhatt said a total of 323 officers were recruited in 2021 while the number in 2022 was 386. In 2021, 5,547 sailors were inducted into the Navy. The number in 2022 was 5,171, he added. To a separate question, he said a technology development fund to provide financial assistance to Indian industries, startups as well as academic and scientific institutions for the development dual use technologies.

The government accepted a Finance Commission recommendation in 2021 to create it, which would provide a dedicated pool of money for capital-intensive purchases like fighter jets and warships.

Indian Army Faces ‘Shortage’ Of Officers

There’s a shortage of 8,129 officers in the Army. This includes Army Medical Corps and Army Dental Corps. In the Indian Navy and Indian Air Force, the number of officers that are needed is 1777 and 721, respectively.

‘Shortage’ Of Officers

In order to tackle the shortage of officers, the army had earlier posted 461 non-empanelled officers to staff appointments wherever possible. The current proposal reportedly involves cutting down some of the staff appointments in headquarters temporarily until the shortage of officer’s decreases. It has reportedly been proposed that junior and mid-level officers currently in staff appointments be posted out once they complete their tenure of 24 months. The Chief of Naval Staff, Admiral R. Hari Kumar, said, ahead of Navy Day, that more than 1,000 women agniveers have been incorporated into the Indian Navy.

Admiral Kumar, while lauding the Agnipath scheme, said that the implementation of Agnipath has been a much-needed, transformational change.