Sixth Central Pay Commission injustices galore for Veterans

It is with extreme agony that we realize that we have wasted our lives serving in the armed forces under the delusion of patriotism. The euphemism ‘being more patriotic than the king’ seems to apply to us to the dot.

That the status and quality of life of the armed forces personnel have been systematically eroded over the last 60 years is a fact of history. The pay commissions have been one of the vehicles used by successive governments, guided by the self serving and manipulative bureaucrats, to perpetuate this gross injustice is also well known. The fact that the three service chiefs have refused to implement the latest pay commission recommendations that have been approved by the government is nothing to cheer about. That they have staked their post-retirement rehabilitation in Raj Bhavans and embassies abroad speak of only one thing- the seriousness of the situation that has developed with morale of the forces taking a plunge, towards the seventh hell if there was one! The list of grievances that has led to the current fiasco is long. Very long, indeed. But here again the chiefs have taken up just 4 issues, possibly based on their priorities and also because of the need to avoid a situation where a long list is presented and the babus prevail to resolve the most simplest of them all and go to town claiming that of the N number of demands so many have been resolved and the others will be considered in due course but never to see the light of the day again. This is not a hypothetical situation that we are painting but one that is borne out of experience.

The issues of One Rank, One pension, lateral employment etc have been hanging fire for decades and the former is even there on the election manifesto of the Congress party leading the current government at the Centre. The dues on account of Rank Pay granted by the 4th Central Pay Commission is still pending with officers having had to form groups and take the matter to the courts. As per reports appearing in the media there are more anomalies waiting to be addressed and pending since then. There is a recent verdict of the apex court in the matter of pension of Major Generals which has reiterated the principle of one rank, one pension. Inspite of all these, the order issued by the Ministry of Defence on 11 Nov 2008 regarding pensions, has introduced what we would like to term as an All Ranks, One Pension scheme! The pension tables indicate just two pensions for all officers as under:

Lieutenant to Lieutenant Colonel: Rs 14000+/-500
Colonels to Lieutenant Generals : Rs 26100+/-500

A similar situation exists for Personnel Below Officer Rank too, in paybands 1 and 2.

Can there be anything more absurd? On delving a little more into the possible reasons for such absurdities being imposed on the armed forces, the subterfuge by the IAS lobby becomes evident. While the pay band scheme covers all services and this situation applies to all such services the only service that is NOT adversely affected by it is the IAS because invariably a direct entrant to IAS will get to the Higher Administrative Grade and an assured pension of Rs 37,750/-!

Suffice to say that we have reached the end of the proverbial tether. We know that we have no role in vote bank politics and are not conditioned to the politics of the streets. But it appears that we will be failing in our duties if we fail to educate the youth aspiring for a career in the armed forces about what waits for them in uniform and out of it. This is something we cannot afford to neglect because it is a call of duty that will have serious repercussions on the security of the country. Fifth columnists have subverted the security of the nation even in the past and when they are ruling the roost the least that soldiers of yesteryears should do is to expose them.

Veteran Major P M Ravindran
Secretary