New Delhi: In a case of private enterprise going against State decision in a matter of foreign and security policy, hundreds of ex-servicemen including retired officers upto the rank of Divisional Commanders are being recruited by private security agencies for deployment in Iraq and first casualities among them has raised the legality of their being in war-torn zone.

Though the security agencies are tight-lipped about the numbers already drafted, sources said these could be anything around 1,500 with the retired commissioned and non-commissioned officers and men being used to guard key installations like oil wells, refineries, supply depots and shore-based facilities in support of US and British forces.

The officers and men are being offered lucrative incentives and salaries, but the first casualties suffered, including a serious injury to a retired Colonel, has set off a raging debate among ex-servicemen's organisations, some supporting the re-employment of old soldiers on foreign soil and others asking the Government to impose a ban.

The demand for Indian ex-servicemen, reportedly made at the instance of Western recruitment agencies, comes even as the Indian Government continues to stick to its decision not to send troops to Iraq on the ground that any deployment there could be only on an explicit UN mandate.

Top Defence Ministry officials said there was no ban on recruitment of ex-servicemen for deployment outside the country and said restrictions could only be imposed if there was a travel ban advisory from the Indian Mission in Baghdad.

But with some casualties reported in their ranks and fresh incidents of kidnappings of foreign nationals taking place, officials said the Government would have a look and ask the agencies to observe caution in recruitment and deployment in Iraq and other war-torn countries.

A senior General of the Adjutant General's Branch at the Army Headquarters said "ex-servicemen cannot seek re-employment during the reserve liability of five years".

"However after that there is no check," he added.

But deaths and other dangers lurking have already injected some amount of caution in these recruiting private security agencies.

Capt Swaran Salaria of the Mumbai-based Trig Guard Force, which had made recruitments for Iraq, said following these incidents further deployment have been held back.

"Though there were no reasons to worry so far, in the last three months things have gone bad and out of control. There have been attacks by locals. I have decided to wait till the threat perceptions lower down drastically," Salaria said. Brig Mohinder Singh, president of the Indian Ex-servicemen Association was more vocal as he urged the Government to bar these agencies from sending ex-soldiers to a war torn zone.

"When the Government itself is cautious in sending troops to Iraq, how can the country allow these ex-servicemen to be deployed there that too armed so lightly," Singh asked.