Assam’s ‘diamond’ Sainik School, one of the oldest in India, has paved the way for a golden phase for its girl cadets.
In 2018, Sainik School Chhingchhip in Mizoram became the country’s first Sainik School to enrol girls. Sainik School Goalpara (SSG), the first of its kind in the northeast, opened its doors for girls three years later.
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Established in 1964 in western Assam’s Goalpara town before shifting to its permanent address at Mornai, about 130 km from Guwahati, the SSG is primarily the reason why the armed forces have many officers from the eight northeastern States. It will complete 60 years on November 12.
“The girls undergo the same drills as the boys from waking up at 4.30 a.m. to retiring for the day at 10.30 p.m. and they are excelling in academics and all other activities. We expect many of them to be in the armed forces,” the school’s principal, Colonel Y.S. Parmar told The Hindu.
The Central Board of Secondary Education-affiliated SSG has 650 students from classes 6 to 12. Each section in the secondary classes has 40 cadets (students), 10 of whom are girls.
The inclination of the girls toward the armed forces has raised hopes for the SSG which has for almost a decade “not been able to perform” as an officer feeder institution for the Army, Navy, and the Air Force.
“We are trying to improve from about five boys who go to the National Defence Academy annually. The slide is not because the standards have come down but the parents, who prefer the residential SSG because of the discipline it ensures, want their wards to be in other services,” Colonel Parmar said.
“We have been organising motivational sessions for our students to join the armed forces and we feel the girl cadets are showing a lot of interest,” he said.
Removing regional imbalance
One of the most celebrated military officers in the northeast is Major Ralengnao Bob Khathing, who led two platoons of the paramilitary Assam Rifles to take possession of Arunachal Pradesh’s Tawang in 1950, establishing Indian administrative control along the McMahon Line.
Known as the home of several warrior communities, the region produced very few armed forces officers after him until the SSG was established three years after the first Sainik School came up in 1961.
“The main objective of setting up the Sainik Schools was to remove the regional imbalance in the officer cadre, which constituted mostly of people from the northern part of the country then. Since the 1970s, the SSG has produced some of the best officers in our armed forces,” Colonel Parmar said.
They include retired officers Air Marshal Anjan Kumar Gogoi, Air Vice Marshals Atul Chandra Saikia and Sanjib Bordoloi, Lt. Generals Pranab Kumar Bharali, Konsam Himalay Singh, and Rana Pratap Kalita, and Major Generals Atul Bhuyan and Bhaskar Kalita.
The school has also produced administrators such as the late Jarbom Gamlin, who was the Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh, former Nagaland Chief Secretary Alemtemshi Jamir and former Assam Additional Chief Secretary Subhash Chandra Das. Among the other notable past pupils is Abhijit Bhattacharya, former captain of the Indian volleyball team.
