800 women to be inducted in military police in the next 15 years

This could be a long-standing move by the Indian Army after the induction of Nirmala Sitaraman as the second female defence minister of India, after Indira Gandhi. The Indian Army is likely to induct 800 women in the military police over the next 15 years.

Adjutant General of the Army Lt Gen Ashwani Kumar, speaking to the Deccan Herald said, "The army is to induct approximately 800 women into military police with a yearly intake of 52 personnel per year."

With gender-specific crimes on the rise in the army, women could prove to be immensely functional in the field of investigation. It is said that the army and the defence ministry are implementing the decision taken earlier this year. Currently, women are allowed only in the field of medical, legal, educational, signals and engineering wings of the army. However, in February, the then President Pranab Mukherjee in his address to the Parliament said that the government is planning to induct women in the future in all he fighter streams of the armed forces. 

The task of the army police is guarding the cantonments and army establishments, maintaining movement of soldiers and logistics during peace and war, preventing the breach of rules and regulations by soldiers, handling prisoners of war and extending aid to civil police whenever needed. 

Indian Air Force allowed women pilots to fly the fighter jets on an experimental basis for five years beginning in June 2016 and the first three women pilots are set to commence their regular flying of Su-30 MKI from later this year. Meanwhile, in the navy women had only been employed in flying the maritime surveillance aircraft and as observers. In all the three services, women had only been deployed in administrative combat-support roles. 

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