NEW DELHI – Indian armed forces are facing a shortage of over 52,000soldiers with the Army topping the list with over 21,000 vacant posts, thegovernment said on Wednesday.

Indian youth reluctance to join the armed forces is the main cause of theshortage.

According to the details provided by Minister of State for Defence SubhashBhamre in the Lok Sabha, the Army is reeling under a shortage of 21,383personnel, while the number of vacant posts in the Navy is 16,348 and15,010 in the Air Force.

Replying to a question, he said 7,680 posts of officers are lying vacant inthe Army. To a question on the Rafale deal, Defence Minister NirmalaSitharaman said all relevant procedures were followed to ensuretransparency in the acquisition of the 36 jets.

India had in 2016 inked an inter-governmental agreement with France forprocuring 36 Rafale fighter jets at a cost of around Rs 58,000 crore. Thedelivery of the jets is scheduled to begin from September 2019.

The Congress has been demanding details of the agreement, including thecost of equipment and weapons, alleging that the deal negotiated under itsrule was much cheaper than the contract signed by the Modi government.

“In the acquisition of 36 Rafale aircraft, all relevant procedure as laiddown in defence procurement procedure were followed to ensure that duetransparency existed in the entire acquisition process,” Sitharaman said.

She said the government preferred the inter-governmental route to procurethe jets considering critical operational requirement of the Indian AirForce.

Replying to a question on whether the nuclear-powered submarine Chakra,which was leased from Russia, suffered extensive damage, she said theinformation cannot be divulged in the interest of national security.

Bhamre also declined to share information, citing national security, whenasked if indigenous nuclear submarine Arihant suffered major damage.