No one, including the PM, should deny armed forces their due pay, pensions
No oNe in this country, including the political executive, should ever think of denying the armed forces personnel and the currently-onprotest veterans what is justifiably due to them.
The issue of pay and perks disparity between the civilian services, including police forces, and the defence personnel dates several decades back, beginning with the third central Pay Commission of 1970, which, for the first time, recommended the de-linking of military pension from military service, resulting in the termination of OROP (one rank one pension) for defence forces by the then Indira Gandhi government. There is more than one reason why the defence forces deserve the best— while in service and after retirement.
The first and the foremost reason, which is an emotional one, is that nobody other than the armed forces personnel will ever be ready to get into a job, knowing they are entering the jaws of death.
For this reason alone, the Narendra Modi government should keep its 2014 Parliamentary poll promise of implementing the OROP immediately. If he chooses to do so during his Independence Day address from the capital’s Red Fort on August 15, he will have only salvaged his image and kept up, albeit belatedly, the trust that the patient 2.5-million strong exservicemen community had reposed in him over a year ago.
There are several anomalies in the defence personnel’s salaries, allowances and service conditions that are not commensurate with the hardship, risks and sacrifice they make. Here are some disparities, drawing from the present set of pay and perks, which the Modi government and the Seventh Pay Commission can look into and do justice to the serving and the retired armed forces community:
Increments: The Indian administrative service (IAS) officers get three increments for each promotion, until the nonfunctional selection grade, during their service life. But the armed forces personnel get only one promotion increment. Defence scientists, on the other hand, get up to six variable increments on their first promotion.
Promotions: IAS officers get promoted to the Senior Administrative Grade (SAG) after 15-16 years of service, become joint secretaries after 18-20 years and additional secretaries after 25-26 years. Group A officers of the government, too, get SAG after 21 years and additional secretary pay after 32 years through nonfunctional upgrading (NFU). Whereas, a major general of the Army or his equivalent in the Navy and Air Force, get to SAG only after 30-33 years of service. They become lieutenant general or equivalent after 34 years. The forces’ officers never get to enjoy the NFU at all.
Pay and seniority: Civilian offices enjoy the pay and seniority, the day the first officer in their batch of service gets promoted to the next rank. Their seniority and pay fixation is done for the entire batch on the same day. In the armed forces, the individual officer’s pay and seniority is fixed only on the day he personally gets appointed or promoted to the next post and rank.
allowances: While the customs and excise officers get `2,500 annually for their uniform, the defence forces officers get `1,000 annually, and only once in three years. While civilian staffers and police forces personnel get Rs 4,000 as headquarters allowance, the defence forces personnel get zilch. Even in the case of fight against Left wing extremism (LWE), the central police personnel get a risk allowance of Rs 4,800 to Rs 6,000 every month. The armed forces get nothing when they serve in LWE-hit areas. In the Kashmir valley, the police personnel get double their housing rent allowance, but the armed forces personnel get nothing, again. In tribal areas, the police forces get a special compensatory allowance at par with the hardship allowance, whereas the armed forces personnel get nothing of the sort.
commando allowance: The CoBRA commandos fighting the Maoists get a special allowance of Rs 7,200 to Rs 11,200, based on their rank. Armed forces’ commandos get a para-allowance of Rs 800 to Rs 1,200.
Training Period: In the case of civilian services and police forces, their period of training before they join their cadre is counted as service period. This is not so in the case of military personnel and this is a great injustice done to them, resulting in loss of seniority compared to their civilian counterparts.
Superannuation: Civilian government officers and employees, and Central armed police personnel, all retire at 60 years. The retirement median ages for non-officer ranks in the armed forces is 35 to 38 years; for junior commissioned officers it is 52 years; and for officers, it is 54 years for those up to the rank of colonel in the Army, and their equivalents in Navy and Air Force. The soldiers are a well-trained and disciplined lot, who could be put to gainful employment in several industrial and service sectors. Unfortunately, even a proposal to provide these young men and women lateral entry into the central armed police and para-military forces has faced stiff resistance from the civilian bureaucracy and from within the respective police and para-military forces.
Disability: In case a civilian employee is disabled, the government is duty bound to retain her/ him in service until 60 years of age, as per the Disability Act, 1965. Armed forces personnel, however, will be booted out of service, as the Act is not applicable to them. They merely get a disability allowance, which is, again, not commensurate with their disability.
Orop: The government expenditure on pensions for defence personnel this fiscal is Rs 54,500 crore. This expenditure is inclusive of the pensions for defence civilians, who approximately number 4 lakh. They aren’t going to be eligible for OROP anyway. The argument against OROP that it would result in exponential rise in government expenditure is fallacious, as year-on-year, the government expenditure for defence pensions is falling as a percentage of the country’s GDP. In the last three fiscals, the defence pension expenditure has been 0.43 per cent (2012-13), 0.40 per cent (2013- 14) and 0.38 (2014-15) per cent, respectively, of the nation’s GDP.