Students protest at Delhi’s ITO against Agnipath scheme

New Delhi: Several students along with the members of All India Students’ Association (AISA) on Friday staged a protest over the Central government’s ‘Agnipath’ scheme for recruitment in the armed forces and demanded its rollback. Holding placards, the students raised slogans against the government and sat in between the old Delhi Police headquarters and the Gate […]

New Delhi: Several students along with the members of All India Students’ Association (AISA) on Friday staged a protest over the Central government’s ‘Agnipath’ scheme for recruitment in the armed forces and demanded its rollback.

Holding placards, the students raised slogans against the government and sat in between the old Delhi Police headquarters and the Gate No 5 of the ITO Delhi Metro Station.

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However, as the numbers kept rising, the security personnel, including CRPF, removed the protesters from the site.

Several protesters were detained by the Delhi Police.

One of the protesters said they did not want a contract job. “Where will we go after years? Our life and career is at stake. The government needs to take it back,” a protestor said.

Meanwhile, the shutters of gate no 5 of the Metro station were downed in wake of the protest.

The Union Cabinet had on Tuesday approved the ‘Agnipath’ recruitment scheme for Indian youth to serve in the Armed Forces. The youth selected under this scheme will be known as ‘Agniveers’. About 46,000 of them will be recruited this year.

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh said that the scheme is a transformative initiative and under it the Indian youngsters will get an opportunity to serve in armed forces.

“The scheme will increase employment opportunities and aims to create a youthful profile of the Armed forces,” Singh said.

However, the scheme, termed as a historic and transformative measure by the government, has met unprecedented levels of agitations and protests in several states across India.