Power of the Young
Re-invent the National Cadet Corps to address the youth bulge challenge
“It is an illusion that youth is happy, an illusion of those who have lost it; but the young know they are wretched for they are full of the truthless ideals which have been instilled into them, and each time they come in contact with the real, they are bruised and wounded”.
— Somerset Maugham
Historically, youth have been at the forefront of revolutionary movements. Be it the Russian and french revolutions or the movement against apartheid in South Africa, the Irish war of independence, the Arab Spring or Che Guevara’s revolutionary movement in contemporary times, the youth have been the agent of change in society mostly because young workers have been amongst the most exploited sections, constantly used as a source of cheap labour.
With this background, a quick snapshot of the state of the Indian youth is in order. Today, if India’s under-15 population formed its own country, it would be the eight most populous country in the world. We are one of the youngest nations in the world with close to 500 million citizens fitting into the central government’s definition of ‘youth’. This army of youth however face extreme challenges. Over 65 per cent of the youth in the working age group is in the labour force, most of whom are migrant labour. Child under-nutrition remains high as roughly two in five children under the age of five are ‘stunted’. Our infant and child mortality rates are higher than countries at comparable or even lower per capita income such as Bangladesh, Nepal, Cambodia, Nicaragua and Vietnam, despite starting out at roughly similar levels on both metrics two decades ago. A study of government schools in Chandigarh found that 50 per cent students consume intoxicants in some form and substance abuse remains a key concern amongst youth across the nation. Education also languishes as foundational skills such as basic reading and arithmetic are lacking in our rural children and the majority of Class V students studying in rural government schools are at the mental level of Class II. further, the gross enrolment ratio in higher education of Indian youth between the age group of 18–23 years is a low 26.3 per cent with only 49 per cent of our youth found to be employable. A former member of Niti Ayog and Director NIPFP stated in an NDTV interview that close to 100 million Indian youth are presently neither in academics nor looking for jobs. The India Today Conclave in Mumbai in 2019 identified that one in every four Indian youth suffers from depression while every hour a student commits suicide. These statistics raise the question whether our youth bulge will be an asset or a liability.
And all this before the Covid-19 tsunami struck. With large scale job losses, consequent enhanced poverty, economic slow-down and resource crunch due to the impact of the pandemic, what will become of our dismal position on the UN key sustainable development goals such as education, energy, food, healthcare amongst others? An already weak public education system has been severely afflicted by the Covid-19 crisis. The current focus on online education due to the pandemic has further widened the divide between the rich and the poor, as government educational institutions and students in rural areas do not have the infrastructure to support on- line studies. Most of our youth lives below the poverty line, with no concept of character or integrity, is poorly educated and trained, and capable of mainly working in the labour force.
The need for comprehensive nation- wide youth engagement on a war footing is evident, failing which we may indeed be staring at a demographic time bomb ticking away and which may perhaps evolve into a ‘key security issue’ in times to come. Our harnessing of this enormous youthful human resource constructively over the next decade is thus essential. UNESCO has stressed on education being the basic building block of nations and the single best investment any country can make towards building prosperous, healthy and equitable societies. The UN General assembly adopted the World Programme of action for youth (WPAY) with 15 areas identified for priority attention by governments for youth. According to the Centre for the Study of Social Policy, Washington, a new science on child development points to the lifelong importance of early experiences, relationships and opportunities in building the ‘architecture of the brain’ and creating the foundation for later health, social and emotional well-being and future success. This is lacking, especially in the government run public education system mostly attended by youth from the poorer segment, where there is minimal attention to elements of the cognitive intelligence : emotional, moral, social and spiritual. While skilling the youth to be able to contribute to the national economy is one aspect, such skills have to be based on foundational character qualities for adequate outcomes.
The National Cadet Corps (NCC) can play a key role in addressing this issue. A 2019 survey of 8000 NCC cadets of North India revealed important findings. Ninety-four per cent of cadets had clear life goals, 85 per cent showed enhanced civic and community consciousness, 90 per cent displayed high peer collaboration and cooperation and 80.66 per cent were very hopeful of the future. The key benefits of NCC training listed by the cadets were character-building and integrity, self-confidence, discipline and team-work : qualities that our nation desperately needs. There is, thus, an urgent need to greatly enhance the reach of the NCC to bring maximum youth into its ambit. With a strength of approximately 14 lakhs cadets, the NCC presently impacts a minuscule percentage of eligible youth. However, immense resources will be needed if we hypothetically induct all eligible youth into the NCC under present administrative and organisational structures, and training methods. A de-novo reappraisal is thus needed to flatten the organisation and reduce revenue costs. In addition, razor sharp focus on essential training while reducing capital intensive activity that benefits only a few cadets will also help in spreading the butter to cover larger numbers.
Based on extensive interaction of the Punjab NCC Directorate with the Finance and Education departments, the Punjab Government made NCC compulsory in the border districts with the dual aims of empowering the youth and curbing drug smuggling. In order to make it financially viable and practical, eligibility was revised as also the syllabus with a flat organisation under the existing state education structure, employing retired but qualified officers (Colonel/ Lt Colonels) and JCOs/ NCOs along with outsourcing of specialised training and administration. It is thus possible to extend this conceptual model nationwide with modifications. The following aspects may be considered to re-invent the NCC to meet contemporary youth aspirations and needs.
Purpose & Vision: The re-alignment of the vision and purpose of NCC to purely focus on aspects such as development of character, integrity, discipline, camaraderie, national integration, self-confidence, social service, etc will guide the efforts at re-inventing the NCC. Post-independence, the NCC was seen as a feeder to the armed forces and as a second line of defence in rear areas. As most armed forces recruitment camps are now majorly over- subscribed, the NCC no longer requires to be a feeder to the armed forces. Similarly, the nation now possesses abundant security resources under the Home Ministry and in the states, for rear area security.
Amalgamation of Army, Navy and Air Force Wing: With a revision in purpose and vision, the need for three wings is not felt and NCC should do away with army, naval or air force specific training. This will reduce equipment and training costs and allow greater spread of the NCC within the same budget. Though navy and air force cadets comprise only seven per cent of the total strength, they consume the lion’s share of the training budget due to their specialised training and equipment costs such as microlites and boats, which mainly remain grounded.
A New NCC Act: Youth empowerment through NCC has to be centrally driven through a new parliamentary act and central budgetary provisions to meet contemporary needs. It has to be implemented through educational institutions and thus needs close coordination between the Education, Youth and Defence ministries.
Reorganisation of the Edifice: Less than 10 per cent of the NCC budget out- lay is actually spent on last mile training of cadets. This is mainly due to excessive revenue budget due to a hierarchical organisation like the armed forces with duplicated functions and due to antiquated procedures which require extra manpower. Reduction of revenue costs by flattening the organisational structure, removing duplicity of staff and functions at different head quarters is the way forward.
NCC Budgeting & Shared Centre-State Responsibilities: This duplicity of responsibilities and rules takes away from the effectiveness of the organisation and inhibits efficiency. Some state governments are non-responsive due to various factors, adversely impacting NCC functioning on ground. The present dual budgeting of activities between the centre and the state results in a documentation nightmare, especially for directorates that are responsible for multiple state as each state has its own budgeting peculiarities. With implementation of GST, it is now possible for the central government to take responsibility for budgeting the NCC entirely. The states should, however, be at liberty to add to the NCC efforts as peculiar to each, with state budgeting.
Rehashing the Syllabus: The basic syllabus be revamped in line with the new vision and purpose of the organisation. It should be promulgated by the centre and should allow flexibility for states to add or modify based on local peculiarities and prevalent social issues. Specialists should be hired to do the needful with a futuristic perspective in mind.
Automation and Simplification of Procedures: Complex administrative and financial procedures, different for centre and state finances as well as HR, enhance the need for manpower and hinder efficiency. Complete support by central government along-with automation and simplified procedures will reduce costs and enhance outcomes.
HR Related Issues: The overall NCC central government cadre strength is approximately 15,587 (including armed forces personnel and civilians) and the overall state cadre strength is approximately 42,872 (including Associate NCC Officers and civilians). The variant central and state government personnel management rules and codes inhibit adequate leverage of this large manpower into effective outcomes for youth training. There is no uniformity across the NCC edifice as these vary from state to state. Thus the Commanding officer of an NCC Battalion in a state where the additional Director General is not the head of the Department, may have little influence over the state government employees under him, as their pay, postings, promotions and punishments are vested with the state education department. Not only do a large number of civil employees thus fail to deliver, even some armed forces officers and personnel on their last-leg postings, lack commitment. Rules governing personnel management should enable efficiency and accountability, which they do not at present. In order to extract maximum outcomes, most of the administrative staff should be contractual. Training staff from armed forces should mostly be re-employed officers, JCOs and ORs who can be terminated with ease in case targeted outcomes are not met. For specialised subjects, civil experts can be hired on a case by case basis. Supervisory HQ staff at the centre and state level should be selected military officers posted with concurrence of Director General NCC.
Streamlining Central Activities for Maximising Outcomes: A number of centrally conducted activities such as competitions, RD Camp, PM’s Rally etc , result in duplicity of effort and concentration of training on a selected few cadets at the cost of the larger majority. While some of these competitions and camps bring value to cadets, a new format is needed which enables larger participation and avoidance of ‘cadet gladiators’ who are over-trained to win competitions.
The Armed Forces Ethos: Th e association of the NCC with the Armed Forces gives it wide acceptance and respect in the eyes of the population and local authorities. This must continue.
Simplifying NCC and Making it Compulsory for Government (Centre/ State) Employment: In order to simplify it, focused NCC training for two years during secondary school stage when youth is impressionable, is recommended. NCC should also be made compulsory for any government job.
Outsourcing of Administration: To reduce revenue costs and ensure efficiency, maximum outsourcing of administrative requirements such as staff, transport and administration is recommended.
Certification: NCC certification should follow the secondary school certification system for testing and awarding of certificate.
The last year, 2020, has been a lost year academically, especially for the under- privileged sections of our youth. Whether 2021 will allow resumption of regular education is anyone’s guess, but the need to empower our large youth resource to contribute beyond just labour is the only way to world economic superpower status. This needs revamping of our entire educational edifice which will be resource heavy and time consuming. Giving sound character qualities to this youth to help them evolve into honest citizens of tomorrow through re-invention of the NCC is a low hanging fruit and is easily doable. For as frederick Douglass said, ‘it’s easier to build strong children than repair broken men’.
