Permanent Commission For Lady Officers In Indian Army

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The News

The Army has constituted a special screening board to select women officers for Permanent Commission.

Since 2008, the Judge Advocate General’s branch and Army Education Corps where Permanent Commission was already given to women.
Now all other eight other branches to get women officers as permanent commissioned officers.
- Signals / Engineers / Military Intelligence / Army Air Defence / Army Ordnance Corps / Army Service Corps / Army Aviation Corps and Corps of Electronics / Mechanical Engineering.

After the latest SC order, a new Selection Board has been constituted by the Army.
The special board came into effect on September 14 2020.
The board is headed by a Senior General Officer and includes a woman officer of the rank of Brigadier.
Women officers have been permitted to witness the proceedings as observers in order to add transparency to the process.

According to recent figures, there are 1,653 women officers currently serving in the Army out of a total of nearly 43,000 officers.
Earlier, PC in Judge Advocate General’s branch and Army Education Corps only,
Now in all wings Women are allowed in PC.

The Army has recently tweaked its physical fitness policy for women officers after the Supreme Court verdict.
Now the Battle Physical Efficiency Test (BPET) for women officers in Army has made it mandatory.
Earlier (since 2011), Women officers, who were commissioned before April 2009 and are above 35 years of age, were excused from BPET. They had only basic Physical Proficiency Test (PPT).

The BPET is a series of physical tests that are meant to test the physical fitness of an officer or a jawan to perform military tasks. For women officers, this includes a five-km run, a 60-metre sprint, climbing vertical rope up to a certain height, traversing horizontal rope up to a certain distance and jumping 6-feet ditch.
As per the new directions, for women in army, the time taken to run 5000 feet/1500 meters in the age category for women officers below 30 years should be 30 minutes or less for ‘Excellent’ grading, 31 minutes 30 seconds for ‘Good’ grading and 33 minutes for ‘Satisfactory’ grading.
- Note: For male officers, it includes a 5 km run (25 mins), 100 m sprint (13 sec), Pull ups, balance and jumping 9-feet ditch.

Women officers must complete a Junior Command (JC) course at Army War College, Mhow, so that they are eligible for Permanent Commission.
Women officers were asked to attend the courses being conducted at the college between July and October in 2020. (Extended due to Covid).
- Note: This course, which is normally attended by male officers with five to 10 years of service, will now see women officers of much senior service bracket — 15 and 16 years of service and more — attending it.