The creation of theatre commands to best utilise the military’s resources could take two to a few years, with senior officers from the three services being assigned key responsibilities to finalise the joint structures, people aware of the developments said on Wednesday.
“The three services have nominated C-in-C ranked officers (senior three-star officers) to finalise the organisational structure and other aspects of theatre commands. These officers will submit an in depth report with their proposals in an exceedingly year after which the creation of theatre commands will begin,” said a senior official, one in all the people cited above.
Defence minister Rajnath Singh on Sunday said discussions on the creation of joint commands and their implementation were progressing well and fast, indicating that differences between stakeholders on the theaterisation model are being addressed and India is on track to line up theatre commands.
“Whenever a change takes place, everyone wants to grasp the change and its effects,” the official said.
The government had in June formed an eight-member panel under chief of defence staff General Bipin Rawat to fine-tune the theaterisation plans and convey all stakeholders on board, especially the Indian Air Force, for quick roll-out of the new joint structures.
The Indian military’s theaterisation model, a long-awaited reform, will have inbuilt flexibility to fall back on the present command and control structures to handle any contingency during the transition phase, the official said. Stabilisation of theatre commands could take up to 5 years, and it’s critical to confirm that there’s a mechanism to swiftly return to the pre-theaterisation established order if a crisis unfolds when the restructuring is underway, HT previously reported.
The militia currently have 17 single-service commands spread across the country. The Indian Army and therefore the Indian Air Force have seven commands each, while the Indian Navy has three. Creating theatres would involve merging the present commands (except the Udhampur-based Northern Command).
In July, Indian Air Force chief Air Chief Marshal RKS Bhadauria flagged concerns about the theaterisation model, arguing that it absolutely was critical to first get the structure right, when General Rawat gave out details of the commit to achieve jointness and ignored the reservations.
The current theaterisation model into consideration seeks to line up four new integrated commands for synergy in operations — two land-centric theatres, the Air Defence Command and also the Maritime Theatre Command.
The Indian Army’s Northern Command is that the only single-service command that may stay outside the scope of the military’s theaterisation drive thanks to its critical role. The Udhampur-based Northern Command is accountable for guarding the country’s borders with Pakistan and China within the north, and is that the nerve centre of counterterrorism operations in Jammu and Kashmir.
