India is a country with a large population, but it has not solved the food crisis like China, so in the photos and videos related to India, many Indians look skinny.
【People at the bottom of India】
But in the photos of the Indian army, the image of Indians has changed dramatically, and the obesity rate of the Indian army is quite high, which can't help but make people curious, what does the Indian army eat, and it is so supportive?
The source of the Indian army
As a populous country, India has no shortage of troops to replenish its troops, and in fact, for many poor Indians, joining the army may be their only option to eat.
【Indian Army Recruitment】
India likes to boast that it is the largest country in South Asia, but to the international community, India is also one of the 121 countries in the world that have not solved the problem of food and clothing, and ranks as high as 107, which is the bottom of the hungry countries.
If you had to look for a reference in the data, India's per capita food level is about the same as that of Afghanistan, which has been in war for a long time and is extremely poor in natural resources.
Considering that India has a total population of 1.4 billion people, hunger in India is actually worse than in Afghanistan, which is why we see that most of the people at the bottom of the Indian population are skinny, because they don't have enough to eat.
In order to fight for a mouthful of food, there is an endless stream of low-level Indian people who go to the army to sign up.
【Indian Army Recruitment】
The Indian army has long been aware of this, so it has been deliberately emphasizing the notion that joining the army means having food.
The system of the Indian army is also very special in the world of the world, generally speaking, the military of all countries is evolving in the direction of professionalization/specialization, but India does not have such a construction idea.
In India, the army is more like a continuation of the army's existence for the sake of having an army, and any enlisted soldier in India can serve for up to 17 years.
This is not to be promoted to an officer or to other positions, but an ordinary soldier can be in the army for 17 years, so joining the army in India is equivalent to half a lifetime of survival.
【Indian Army】
In order to obtain valuable qualifications to join the army, Indians will do everything they can to meet the recruitment standards in the Indian army during the medical examination. And the more poor people who can't survive, the more they want to be selected by the army.
That's why we see that when the Indian army recruits new recruits every year, most of the Indians who come here are skinny and have to work hard to make themselves very strong.
What does the Indian army eat
But what is unbelievable is that the obesity rate of the Indian army is among the highest in the world's armies, and the vast majority of Indian soldiers, no matter how skinny they were when they joined the army, often looked like they were full of fat when they left the army.
[The Indian army has a serious obesity problem]
This can't help but make people wonder, what exactly did these Indian officers and soldiers experience in the army?
The obesity problem of the Indian army is very complicated, and one of the more important reasons is that the eating habits of the Indian army are not healthy, and the traditional food in India is high in oil and sugar, and almost all of them are so-called energy bombs.
And the daily food of the Indian army is precisely these, and it is strange that Indian officers and soldiers consume huge amounts of sugar and oil mixtures every day, and they do not gain weight.
【Indian Army Food】
Butter is used in almost all typical Indian dishes, especially the most beloved pasty food in India, and butter is added to it.
This is understandable for the people at the bottom of India, after all, when there is no guarantee of one meal a day, the more calories each meal is naturally supplemented, the better.
But the situation of the Indian army is different, three meals a day can be guaranteed, and in such a situation, a large intake of butter with extremely high energy is naturally very easy to gain weight.
In addition to the unhealthy food intake, another reason for the serious obesity problem in the Indian army is the lack of exercise, which may surprise many people to join the army and actually have the problem of insufficient exercise.
【Indian Army Officer】
The Indian Army's obesity population is composed of lower- and middle-class officers, who enjoy a better level of food than the average soldier, but do not have to participate in daily military training, and it is not an exaggeration to describe Indian officers as pampered.
Moreover, before joining the army, middle- and lower-level officers were generally poor, and suddenly they had no worries about food and clothing when they couldn't eat enough, and many people began to indulge themselves, let alone manage their bodies.
However, the real top of the Indian army does not actually have the so-called obesity problem, and the Indian caste system is also reflected in the military administrative system, and there are no low-caste high-ranking Indian officers.
【Indian Caste System】
The growth environment and even cultural customs of these people are completely different from those of the bottom of India, and their diet does not like high-sugar and high-oil foods, and even many people are vegetarians, so they will naturally maintain a better body shape.
The moths of the Indian army
Since most of the Indian officers and soldiers are here for food, and the Indian army invests a huge amount in food, the department in charge of food in the Indian army is also the department with the most oil and water, and the problem of corruption can be said to be repeated and prohibited.
And unlike other countries' armies that use their brains for corruption, Indians basically have no brains, so they can do anything.
In 2017, India's Ministry of Defense received a letter from a grassroots soldier complaining that the food in his unit tasted terrible, saying that it was similar to pig feed.
Grassroots soldiers in India report on army food
After the Indian Ministry of Defense intervened in the investigation, it was found that the soldier was really right, the food provided by this unit to the soldiers was really pig feed, and the department in charge of the army's food had embezzled all the funds and could only feed the soldiers pig feed.
This kind of thing, which sounds unthinkable in other countries, is very common in India, because the matter of feeding soldiers with pig feed has appeared more than once in India, and it will not stop in the future.
Moreover, compared with other shoddy things, pig feed can at least not kill people and ensure the nutritional intake of officers and soldiers, and it can still make soldiers fat, which is already quite conscientious.
Sources:
[1] India's Military Rank and Military Service System.sina.com [Citation date:2013-01-20]
[2] Indian media: Indian Army promotes the study of Mandarin.xinhuanet [Citation date:2022-04-19]