Indian armed forces are known for their active services and accurate way of handling all situation, whether it be a national or international matter. From war times to the disaster scenario, armed forces always stood ahead. All the three services of armed forces, Army, Air Force and Navy have their special forces to tackle any immediate arid situation. Indian Army’s paramilitary forces, Navy has got MARCOS and Indian Air Force has GARUD. These elite segments of armed force are trained to withstand terror attacks on public. These forces are the symbol of toughness and that’s why named as Special Forces. These forces recruit from the serving personals and train then as per requirement, making them a special person called commando. Here we are discussing how an aspirant can get into GARUD commando force.
GARUD commando force is known as the latest fragmented force possibly observed in 2004. The decision of raising a new force with strength of 1080 commandos was taken in 2003 after Air force felt need of its own special force and reducing dependency over Army’s Special Forces. It aims at pacifying and tackling an emergency situation of terror threats and responding to it. Along with this search and rescue, combat, handling counter insurgencies are the task performed by this unit. As per the sources, GARUD force is deployed in Congo as peace keeping force.
The basic selection of GARUD commandos is through two processes. The process is on the bases of commission. For non- commissioned vacancies, airmen selection process and for commissioned post, ground duty trainees of GDOC.
- Non-Commissioned Post – The selection for GARUD is done directly and not from volunteers, through Airmen Section Centres. Recruitment is initiated by the release of notification/ advertisement. Most interestingly, there is no second chance for section. Means it’s now or never. And after selection, you have to make grade during your training schedule. And if you fail, you are out. After the completion of training, the trainees are merged into the force. After joining the force, one keeps in this stream till he serves in Indian Air force.
- Commissioned Posts – Commissioned post for GARUD units are filled by the cadets of ground duty at Air force Academy, Dundigal. And for GDOC, you have AFCAT exam. After getting trained, they get into the GARUD unit.
As far as training is concerned, the initial phase of training takes place at GARUD regiment training centre, Hindan. Next phase of training is given by a special group consisting of members form Army, NSG, Paramilitary force and Special Frontier force. Along with this, these men gets training under parachute training school, diving school of Navy and jungle warfare school of Army. And final phase is meets with Special Forces units of Army.
Special Forces plays a crucial part in Indian security. And with the hike in attraction towards armed forces, GARUD has also seen hike in aspirants. Aspirants preparing for AFCAT got a chance to serve in GARUD and become a part of this special group.
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