Awarding a bonanza gift of New Year to the armed forces, the government of India has decided to constitute a separate pay commission detaching from existing pay commission for civilian employees to handle the pay profile of armed forces.
The Prime Minister’s office in this regard has reportedly sent a letter to the cabinet secretary informing him about government’s decision, so that the anomalies with armed force officials, including lieutenant colonels in the Indian Army and equivalent post in the Indian Navy and Indian Air Forces can be resolved.
But official has so far not issued any formal notification regarding this, sources said. After issuing the formal notification, the process of constituting an independent pay revision committee would likely to begin but the new pay panel for armed forces would begin it’s functioning after five years and the first recommendation of this committee would come with the recommendations of seventh pay panel for civil employees, sources added.
This news might irk the army personnel, an army official said commenting on this latest unconfirmed reports. The Indian armed forces were demanding since long time from the government to hike the pay scale of lieutenant colonels in the Indian Army and their equivalents in other wings of armed forces equivalent to their counterparts in the paramilitary forces and civilian bureaucrats, added officials.
But the government always prefers to ‘babus’ and other civilians who works in the offices in the secured environment, infuriated officials said, adding that if this sort of step-mothering behaviour continues with armed forces, the Indian army would have to face mass and intelligent crunch in the future as the youngsters would move towards other attractive careers.
Meanwhile, the government has also reportedly accepted the long demand of defence officials to improve the pay grade of Lt. Colonels and their equivalents, who are maximum in numbers in the defence sector by raising their pay grade from Pay Band –III (Rs 15,600-39,100) to Pay Band –IV (Rs 37,400-67,000).
After implementation of this proposal, the Lt. Colonel would be senior to deputy secretaries but junior to directors to the government.
For resolving complaints, the government would also set up a grievance redresser cell pertaining to resolving the conflict of payments to armed forces.
For jawans, the government has decided to restore the 70% pensionary weightage on retirement, sources reported.
As it is known, after submitting the Sixth Pay Commission’s report before the Finance Ministry, the army officials as well as other non-bureaucrats had asked the government to rectify the recommendations of Sixth Pay Commission. In this move, the Defence Ministry had set up a review committee under the chairmanship of cabinet secretary K Chandrashekhar to seek out the relevant anomalies pertaining to various demands of defence officials. On the basis of the recommendations of Chandrashekhar Committee, the government has reportedly informed the cabinet to approve it.
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