SCPC: New deal for Lt Cols

Photo Bharat RakshakCombat ReadyNew Delhi, January 9
In less than 10 days after the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) conveyed its decision to the Ministry of Defence on the pay-related anomalies of the armed forces, the latter have found a way out to get enhanced status for all Lt Colonels and their equivalent ranks in the Navy and the IAF. To the PMO’s condition that only Lt Colonels, who are on “combat” or “ready-for-combat posts” will be given the enhanced status of pay band 4 and grade scale of Rs 8,000, the forces have conveyed to the Defence Minister that all the 12,000 officers in this rank fall in the category of combat or ready- for-combat. A formal written communiqué is being drafted in this regard. Service chiefs conveyed the logic of treating all posts as combat or ready for combat as the nomenclature of such posts does not exist in the glossary of the forces, as they have only three kinds of posting — field, modified field and peacetime. This had created apprehension in the minds of the officers.

Ajay Banerjee
Tribune News Service
All officers fall under combat or ready-for-combat category, MoD told