National Cadet Corps 1- An Introduction

 

Young Boys and Girls, donning a heavy uniform, parading in the morning, each weekend where their non-cadet friends are sleeping and having their typical Sunday morning. The trouble, as some would call it, makes them stand apart. It makes them individuals with distinguished characters and skills and makes them more confident to face any other situation. As a NCC Cadet for 2 years, I can say it has impacted my life to a great extent.

National Cadet Corps or NCC is the second line of defence of our country. It is an independent set of corps that was established in the year 1988 as a unit that will intake students. The reason was to nurture and develop character, comradeship, discipline, a secular outlook, the spirit of adventure, and ideals of selfless service amongst young citizens of the country. (NCC India, n.d.) The motto is ‘Unity and Discipline’, which is inculcated in a cadet.

I am fascinated by uniforms and badges over it. The words from a PR video of the Indian Army stay in my mind always, where Major Praful Kumar says “I wear my Resume over my uniform”. I was more into Indian Air Force. I loved planes, I loved how ATC worked. Loved their simple living yet each man with a great brain concept. I believed that that like IPS, maybe there would be a direct examination to become an Air Commodore directly and I can climb up to Air Chief Marshal before I retire. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. Sigh! Don’t laugh at me, I was in grade 3/4.

When I moved to a bigger campus for classes above 6, that campus had NCC affiliation and I planned to join it when I move to class 8. I participated in annual house parades for the Republic Day. I got through the selection procedure- I had no physical issues. For someone without training, I was good at parades and knew basic stuff around NCC and Defence. I joined 1(ODISHA) Battalion NCC. It was pretty exciting. We had two days a week as NCC classes post the regular school timing and I loved wearing the uniform to school. We used to visit Battalion once a month, mostly Saturday for a Parade training by trained Instructors from OTA, NDA, and to learn and fire riffles in the firing range.

I attended my first camp as a selection procedure for RDC, which I will write down in a blog titled NCC 2. I loved how those days, even though tiring and exhausting, were meaningful at the end of the day.