Jointmanship At National Defence Academy
NDA: Sowing the Seeds of Jointmanship by Col Sudhir Sakhuja (Retd), VSM Hunter/47Jointmanship At National Defence Academy
Jointmanship in the three Defence Forces will now be firmly cemented with the appointment of a Chief of Defence Staff. Naturally the Institution which initiates this process needs to be dynamic and further strengthened.
Graduates from this great Institution are equally concerned that their great Alma Mater should always remain in the forefront in providing the required leadership to the Indian Defence Forces and the Country.
Here is an article written by an alumni of 47 Course (Jan 72 to Dec 74), who has now settled down in Australia :
It has been a while since I retired from the Army and 48 years since I joined the NDA as a cadet. Surely since then a lot of water has flown down the Mula-Mutha rivers of Pune. I am also aware that in relation to the future direction for NDA, several studies and reviews have been carried out concerning recruitment standards, selection processes, different aspects of training, physical and psychological toughening of cadets, academic curriculum, criteria for posting of officers from the three Services including the top leadership, suitable civilian staff for academics, clothing and equipment, infrastructure, etc. Indeed, well-meaning and knowledgeable officers from all the three Services have written several articles on the above mentioned topics in different forums. Some of the authors have served at the NDA in recent years and, unlike me, are quite current in their understanding of the issues concerning our alma mater. I therefore prefer not to comment upon or add to what has already been said. Instead, given the unique tri-services composition of the NDA, I will restrict my observation to jointmanship at the NDA.
There are several pathways available for a young person to be commissioned as an officer in the Indian Armed Forces. However, with the exception of the NDA, there is no other training establishment where cadets from all three Services are trained together and that too for an extensive period of three years.
Cadets who are trained in institutions other than the NDA obviously do not have the advantage of having their course mates and friends in the Services other than their own.
The importance of jointmanship in modern warfare needs no elaboration. But does NDA adequately train its cadets in this facet? I am afraid, it does not.
The NDA is not just the ideal institution, but also the only institution where the cadets of one Service can and should be trained in at least the basic tactics and administrative aspects of the other two Services.
One way of achieving this is by exposing the Army cadets to a term each exclusively focused on Naval and Air aspects of warfare. This training should be carried out on naval ships, at air force bases or their training establishments and not just at the NTT or AFTT at the NDA.
Similarly, the Army-specific training for the Naval and Air Force cadets could be spread across say the Infantry, Mechanized and Artillery establishments and also with units deployed in LC/CT operations.
During this period of training, it is also imperative that the role of the other Services in different battles be studied and analysed in some detail.
A simple wargame/exercise on jointmanship could also be conducted in the sixth term. Thus in the three years of training at the NDA, a cadet would have spent one year in understanding the basics of two Services other than his own. These would be the first baby steps in jointmanship in his future service career.
Effective crossattachments for training NDA cadets of all the three Services are essential because postcommissioning, few officers get such inter-services exposure.
Arguably, the proposed training will eat-into the hours mandated for the undergraduate qualifications. However, there is no reason why jointmanship studies cannot be a part of the undergraduate curriculum.
Even if the JNU raises objection, a workaround can be found by getting cadets to complete their mandatory and foundational courses/subjects through the blended and/or intense modes of delivery.
Yes, the NDA enables its cadets from the three services to develop friendship and camaraderie. But this is a perfunctory achievement. It needs to look deeper into the essence of jointmanship and initiate cadets into this essential facet of warfare. **********
Col Sudhir Sakhuja (Retd) was a five-star ‘torchie’ ( academic distinction ) at the NDA. He was commissioned into the Madras Regiment and went on to command 10 Madras. A graduate through a competitive vacancy from the Defence Services Staff College, Wellington, he also holds a doctorate in management. He held operational staff appointments in the Military Operations Directorate (China Desk); served as a Directing Staff at Army War College, Mhow. He also had a long stint in the South Block as the Army Spokesperson with three successive Army Chiefs. Post retirement, Sudhir touched the lives of hundreds of young post-graduate students from the fields of media, communication and management as a senior academic for over eight years. He is presently in an administrative role with RMIT University, Melbourne. He loves to cook and read non-fiction, especially memoirs. Married to Shobha, a chemist with a paint multinational, they both have the travel bug. Theirs is a happy-big family.
