The Hindu : Kerala / Kochi News : `Job scarcity forcing ex-servicemen to work as mercenaries in Iraq'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Apr 06, 2004

Kerala

Kerala - Kochi

`Job scarcity forcing ex-servicemen to work as mercenaries in Iraq'

By Our Special Correspondent

KOCHI, APRIL 5 . It is the acute shortage of jobs that drive ex-servicemen, who are forced to retire in their early middle-age, to work as mercenaries in Iraq and other areas of conflict, according to K.P. Saidalavi, general secretary of the National Ex-servicemen Coordination Committee (Kerala).

"Many of these ex-soldiers are well aware of the risks involved in such jobs," he told The Hindu . "But they are forced to take up them because they don't get a job that pays at least Rs. 2,000 a month."

Mr. Saidalavi was referring to the recent reports of ex-soldiers being recruited by Kuwait-based recruiting agencies to work as mercenaries alongside the U.S. forces in Iraq. He said most of these ex-soldiers had been recruited as security guards to work in Kuwait, but the truth was that they were meant to protect the American interests in Iraq. Some of them had been plainly told that they would have to work in Iraq too, but still they would not care as what they wanted was a paying job.

Mr. Saidalavi pointed out that most of those recruited had earlier been working for the Army's Infantry division. This was because people from the Infantry could be easily retrained to use sophisticated American weapons. Only healthy ex-soldiers below 45 years were recruited. He noted that the recruitments were mainly from Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, as ex-soldiers from these States spoke English.

He suspected that since there was no official Indian soldier to fight alongside the U.S. and British troops in Iraq, those recruited as mercenaries from India were being formed into an `Indian regiment' with special uniforms so that it could boost the morale of soldiers from other nations.

Mr. Saidalavi noted that ex-servicemen had in the past been mainly re-employed as security guards as well as in various jobs in the public-sector units. Because of the freeze on recruitment in the PSUs, that avenue had been closed.

And, with the arrival of private security agencies in a big way, the security jobs too had dried up.

These agencies charged lower wages than the ex-jawans did. Even the KSRTC, which used to pay Rs. 100 to ex-jawan security guards, was now opting for private agencies as their asking wages were lower, he said.

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