![]() ![]() But a handful of officers did offer feeble justifications for its continuance, vindicating it on grounds of hoary tradition, aspects of which the army’s Adjutant General was critically evaluating, at present, for discontinuation. None of the officers The Wire spoke with wanted to be quoted on the subject of sahayaks, terrified of being vilified and ‘savaged’ by their colleagues. However, queries regarding the perpetuation of sahayaks in the army, from both in-service and veteran officers, elicit either aggressive silence, an embarrassed chuckle or a vituperative tirade on the number of orderlies and other similar staff dragooned to serve police officers, civil servants and even retired judges, at government expense. Additionally, senior army officers, in true colonial grandeur, were provided armies of khansamas (cooks), masalchis (assistant cooks), dhobis and gardeners, in addition to multiple guards around their massive Raj-era bungalows. ![]() In continuation of colonial norms, all army officers from the time they are commissioned as lieutenants – earlier second lieutenants – are assigned sahayaks, as part of an accepted practice, which continues, uninterruptedly, till they retire, and at times even later. ![]() Renamed ‘sahayaks’ (helpers) in the mid-1980s in a feeble attempt at distancing them from their colonial association, these soldiers conservatively number between 25,000-30,000 personnel – or the equivalent of a regular army corps. Chandigarh: The Indian Army has embarked on ‘de-colonising’ its customs, uniforms and assorted rituals and procedures, however, nobody from the force – currently serving or retired – has even remotely mentioned assessing the invidious British tradition of ‘batmen’, or personal orderlies, who continue to be assigned to serve all army officers. ![]()
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