Pune: Over 75% Cadets At NDA From Non-Military Families

NDA Cadets Pune
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New Delhi/Pune, 20th June 2021: An internal assessment shows that the majority of the cadets at the National Defence Academy (NDA), Khadakwasla in Pune, are from non-military backgrounds.

According to the data collected by the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), in the last six batches, out of 1,862 cadets, 5.47% are from military officers’ families while 75.67% are from non-military backgrounds. About 18.9 % of cadets are sons of Junior Commissioned Officers (JCO) or Jawans.

Earlier, a large number of cadets at the NDA were children of officers. Many cadets prefer to get commissioned into the same regiment as their fathers’. However, despite better salaries and assured pension on retirement, the numbers have been decreasing gradually over the past 15 years.

The National Defence Academy is a unique and premier tri-services military training institution in the world. It attracts the best talent amongst the youth of our nation and from friendly foreign countries and imparts military and academic education to the cadets to acquire physical, intellectual, mental and moral qualities for a meaningful career in the defence services as permanent commissioned officers. NDA is the world’s first tri-services academy unique in its design and concept. It has acquired an iconic status and has encouraged many other countries to emulate this core concept of enforcing synergy at the entry-level itself.

On 6th October 1949, Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru laid the foundation stone for the construction of a grand and imposing academy complex at Khadakwasla, about 17 km from Pune. The Academy started functioning on 16 January 1955.

As the Cradle of Military leadership, NDA trains junior leaders for the Indian Armed Forces. Nearly 38,000 cadets have passed out of its portals since its inception in 1949. These include about 1200 international cadets from friendly countries. NDA alumni have provided leadership across the entire spectrum of conflict – from the cutting edge of the tactical level to the level of operational art and the domain of strategic guidance and direction of campaigns. Many of them have become the Chiefs of the three Services.

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