Mind Over Merit

In a recent piece in The Print, Gen Panag discusses the recent government decision to adopt a ‘merit based’ approach over ‘seniority based’ on the promotion of Lt Gens, and opines it is a move in the right direction. He also points out some shortcomings and offers suggestions to make the system of promotions to apex ranks in the Army further effective. While I don’t disagree with the General’s assessment of the current system, he has missed out a critical piece of the puzzle which I would like to highlight. And that is the issue of merit in promotion UP TO the rank of Lt Gen needs to be addressed as well to really make the changes worthwhile.

The first level of merit based selection takes place when the officers face the selection board for promotion from the rank of Lt Col to Col, currently at about 16 years of service. In this board, number of officers selected depends on the number of vacancies available. However, these vacancies themselves are divided between the different Arms and Services within the Army. Thus, say if a total of 300 vacancies for promotion are available in General Cadre, 10 may go to Armoured Corps, 10 to Mechanized Infantry, 30 to Artillery, 30 to Engineers and similar numbers to other combat support arms, while about 200 go to Infantry. These figures are illustrative, the distribution of vacancies is pro-rata, based on the overall strength of each arm. While this pro-rata distribution of vacancies has it’s logic, it is the first stage at which the overall merit of the batch gets disrupted. It results in a number of officers from arms other than Infantry who are higher in overall merit getting weeded out while those much lower in merit in Infantry being promoted. For instance, in the batch of 300, an officer from Mechanized Infantry who is 30th in the overall merit will not get promoted is he’s 11th among the Mechanized Infantry officers, while the officer from Infantry who is 200th in the overall batch merit will get promoted if he’s 199th in Infantry. By selecting someone 200th in the batch over another who is 30th, the merit for General Cadre begins being skewed at the very first stage. 

The compromise of overall merit continues in the ranks of Col and Brig because of the pro-rata vacancy allotment in career courses like Higher Command, Higher Defence Management Course and National Defence College (NDC). Due to steepness of the promotion pyramid, officers who are not nominated to attend these courses are almost certain not to be promoted to the next rank. Thus, out of the 10 who had been promoted to Col from Mechanized Infantry, only 6 may attend the career courses. The other four would be weeded out despite being higher in merit than a large number of Infantry officers who do get detailed purely because of larger number of vacancies in the courses for the arm. A similar weeding out takes place when Brigs are detailed for NDC course. It is notable that this vacancy based pro-rata system for promotions and nominations was not in vogue earlier, and was introduced only in the 90s for various reasons. You can refer to this for more details on the origin of the vacancy based pro-rata system.

As a result of this culling at various levels, the officers facing the selection board in the rank of Maj Gen do not truly represent the full potential of merit of the batch. If fair and equitable merit based appointment at the apex level of command have to be ensured, it needs to be applied from the very first promotion board itself, and ensured throughout the selection process right up to the rank of Lt Gen.

That having been said, the subjective nature of determining the merit at each stage itself needs to be addressed. Due to the nature of its functioning in peace time, there are no quantifiable deliverables on which officers at various ranks can be objectively assessed. As a result, the ACRs are bound to be based on the subjective opinions (and, unfortunately, sometimes the biases) of the Initiating and Reporting Officers up the chain of command. One way to reduce, though admittedly not completely eliminate the subjectiveness in assessment is to introduce a well thought out 360 degrees reporting system.

The aspect of regimental / arm based nepotism mentioned by Gen Panag is a sad reality. An unbiased examination of results of the Maj Gen to Lt Gen promotion board results over the past decade, tracking the merit graph of those not selected over their careers and identifying the stage and reason for the drop in merit would be instructive.

If these shortcomings in the merit based selection system up to the rank of Lt Gen are addressed, the pool of officers available for apex level appointments would be a truer representation of the best talent of the batch. It would then make the proposed exercise of merit based selection of Lt Gens truly meaningful.

A final word of caution regarding the drawback of doing away with the seniority based promotion of Lt Gens. There is a possibility of the temptation of senior officers ‘playing the tune considered melodious’ to the political leadership. One of the functions of senior leadership of an organisation like the Armed Forces is to provide unfiltered and unbiased inputs to the political leadership, whether they are palatable or not. The perception that such plain speak might mar promotional prospects may discourage any dissent no matter the desirability of plain speak in organisational interest.

Government driven Initiatives to optimise the effectiveness of Armed Forces through merit based promotions are a welcome step. For these to be truly meaningful, a deeper dive into the overall treatment of merit even during the early service career needs to be studied and addressed.