Retiring armed forces medical officers to get extension till December

Around 200 Short Service Commission SSC officers with the Armed Forces Medical Services AFMS due for retirement over the next seven months will get an extension till December 31 in view of the Covid19 situation in the country a senior Army officer said on SundayLt Gen Dr Madhuri Kanitkar who is part of the medical team under the Chief of Defence Staff said they will be deployed for Covid19 management programme initiated by the armed forcesShort Service Commission officers of the AFMS who are retiring in the next seven months will be given a unilateral extension So we have around 200 such medical officers who were to retire we will continue to have their servicesSo we are holding back these medical officers who would have otherwise left us Lt Gen Kanitkar the Deputy Chief of Integrated Defence Staff Medical under the Chief of Defence Staff told PTI hereThe orders for implementation of this plan are expected soon as the proposal is in advance stages of approval said Lt Gen Kanitkar the third women officer to have reached to the level of threestar general in the armed forces The other two were Punita Arora who worked with the army and later shifted to the Navy and Air Marshall Padma BandopadhyayThe SSC medical officers are granted commission in the armed forces for a tenure of five years which is extendable by another 5 years for those who are willing to continue subject to laid down eligibility criteriaLt Gen Kanitkar feels that the present Covid19 crisis has taken every country back to the drawing board and rework their plans according to the ageold saying health is wealthI think we need to ramp up basic primary health infrastructure In this kind of pandemic even countries with the best of the infrastructures collapsed If we look that way we have performed much better during the first wave of the pandemic she saidAmong the host of services launched by the armed forces include starting a website SeHAT Services eHealth Assistance and Teleconsultation to provide assistance to the families of armed forces as well as exservice personnelHaving served during the Kargil war in 1999 when she was posted to the Northern Command Lt Gen Kanitkar feels that today the doctors are frontline workers while soldiers are helping the medical fraternity in fighting the pandemicIn addition those retired from AFMS have been advised to help in their respective localities and the local army commanders can be their facilitatorAlready senior doctors including a retired Director General of Armed Forces Medical Services have started providing teleconsultation to needy as well as to the exservicemen she saidState government hospitals would be provided with Nursing Assistants who have retired from the service she saidSome of the SSC medical officers who have recently retired from the armed forces may also be roped in on a voluntary basis and used for Covid19 management she saidThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever