The government on Saturday night formally notified the one rank one pension (OROP) scheme for the over 24 lakh ex-servicemen and six lakh war widows around the country. The scheme will entail an additional outgo of around Rs 8,000 to 10,000 crore every year.
The notification is more or less in line with what defence minister Manohar Parrikar had announced on September 5, except that the clause that exempted personnel who retire voluntarily from the scheme. There had been removed after widespread outcry among the veterans over this clause.
Instead, the government has now decided that personnel who opt for “discharge henceforth on their own request will not be entitled to the benefits of OROP”. In other words, while soldiers who took pre-mature retirement earlier will get OROP, fresh cases will not. “It will be effective prospectively,” said an official.
But the veterans said they would continue with their agitation, which has entered the 146th day now, since the government had failed to resolve “any of the seven main anomalies” in the “diluted OROP” that had been notified.
“We have been cheated by the government. We will not accept it. We will meet to decide the future course of action, including the plan to return medals medals to the district commissioners or magistrates in all the 647 districts of the country on November 9-10,” said Group Captain VK Gandhi (retd) of the United Front of Ex-Servicemen (UFESM).
The government, however, said the order had been issued to implement the OROP in “its true spirit” notwithstanding the financial constraints. “The previous UPA government had made a budget announcement to implement the OROP with a provision of Rs 500 crore,” said an official.
“But the present NDA government undertook the task earnestly and realised that the actual additional annual expenditure would be Rs 8,000-10,000 crore, which will increase in the future,” he added.
Successive governments had promised OROP, the demand for which was first raised over 40 years ago, but it had not been implemented till now.
The veterans, however, said they wanted “pension equalization or adjustment” at least once every two years, while the government has stuck to its stand that it will be done only at five-year intervals because of the huge administrative work involved.
The veterans are also opposed to the government taking calendar year 2013 — instead of financial year 2013-14 — as the base year for pension fixation. Moreover, the government has decided pensions will be re-fixed for all those retiring in same rank with same length of service as the “average” of minimum and maximum pension in 2013. But the veterans want the highest pension scale of 2013 to be taken into account for this calculation.
The veterans are also opposed to the setting up of a one-man judicial commission to resolve the anomalies arising out of OROP implementation in six months. The veterans wanted a five-member committee, with three of their representatives, to submit its report within a month.