In a first, Indian Army artillery regiments to get women officers this month

New Delhi, April 7: In a huge positive development, women officers will be commissioned in the Army's artillery regiments later this month when they pass out of the Officers' Training Academy (OTA) at Chennai.

This will be the first time women officers, who are already flying fighters in the IAF and serving on board warships in the Navy, will be trained to handle howitzers and rocket systems.

 

 

It is major development to induct women officers in the Regiment of Artillery, which has over 280 units handling a variety of howitzers, guns and multiple-launch rocket systems. Army chief General Manoj Pande had later said the proposal had been sent to the government for approval, which finally came on March 20.

Women officers are still not allowed to join the main combat arms. But while artillery may be designated as a 'combat-support arm', it's on the frontlines of war-fighting with many regiments deployed along the unresolved volatile borders with both China and Pakistan.

 

The women officers who will get commissioned into artillery will first serve for some time in the units they are assigned to. They will then, like their male coursemates, be sent for artillery-specific courses, which will begin with gunnery training on the 105mm Indian field guns.

 

The artillery regiments have a variety of guns that range from the 105mm field guns, Bofors howitzers, 'upgunned' Dhanush and Sharang guns to the new M-777 ultra-light howitzers and K-9 Vajra self-propelled tracked guns. The indigenous Pinaka multi-launch rocket systems as well as similar Russian-origin Smerch and Grad units are also part of the artillery.