Loopholes in any scheme can be removed: Ajit Pawar on Agnipath protests

Amid protests over the Centre's Agnipath scheme, Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar said loopholes in a government scheme, if any, can be removed to ensure that everyone benefits out of it

Amid protests in parts of the country over the Centre's Agnipath scheme for recruitment into the armed forces, Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar on Thursday said loopholes in a government scheme, if any, can be removed to ensure that everyone benefits out of it.

"Lacuna, if any, can be removed to ensure that the scheme is beneficial to all," Pawar told reporters in Pune while responding to a query on the protests.

Protests against the Agnipath scheme were witnessed in many states on Thursday, including Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Madhya Pradesh.

The government unveiled Agnipath on Tuesday - calling it a "transformative" scheme - for the recruitment of soldiers in the Army, Navy and the Air Force, largely on a four-year short-term contractual basis. Under the scheme, around 46,000 soldiers will be recruited this year between the ages of 17-and-a-half years and 21 years into the three services, the defence ministry said.