From a week prior to the 69th Independence day a series of meetings between UFESM reps and Governmet/government appointed officials have been taking place. Some information, of the dramatis persona, the locations of the meetings and the discussions there on are doing the rounds. The media is reporting the same from, firstly its own sources in government and secondly as per briefings given out by the media centre of the UFESM.
The aim of this missive is to clear the cobwebs and put atters in the correct perspective.
First Attempt at Resolution: As a possible run up to the 15th of Aug and a fallout of the ultimatum of escalation from 16th Aug by UFESM if no announcement is made that day. The government emissary was Gen VP Malik the former COAS, the meetings were overseen by the good offices of Mr Rajeev Chandrashekhar, MP with the COAS and fin ministry as well as PMO officials in attendance. The UFESM team comprised of Lt Gen Balbir Singh, Maj Gen Satbir Singh & Gp Capt VK Gandhi. The discussions veered around a grand reduction of approximately 4-600 Cr from the worked out figures by MoD of Rs 8293 Cr. The way suggested was for UFESM to accept 2011 as the base year of fixation that would imply that there would be no fixation as it was in 2011 that pensions were last fixed, secondly to push the payout date forward from 1/4/2014 to 1/4/2015, finally that there would be no yearly review of pension and that reviews would be limited to awards of successive pay commissions. Since this was against the very spirit of Parliamentary acceptance of OROP, Not only did UFESM reject the proposal unequivocally but the Government appoint interlocutor Gen Malik recused himself within 48h. The government reps did request UFESM to call off the agitation and go slow on the escalation for a period of ten days. The first part was rejected but the second part was considered for implementation. However Col Pushpendra Singh & Hav Major Singh refused all efforts to the cotrary and went on Fast-unt-death (FUD) wef 16th Aug. The other points of escalation came into effect the same day. These were: -
1.15th August declared as a black day for ESM.
2. Boycott of all government run/sponsored functions will be enforced.
3. Black flags and Black arm bands will be displayed by all ESM
4. RHS to continue.
5. FUD will nor be discouraged unless medical condition warrants
As a result, no announcement was made
Second Attempt at Resolution: Exactly ten days from Independance day that is on 25 Aug the system of meetings re-started. Since then there have been the following meetings almost on a daily basis. For all meetings only General’s Balbir & Satbir have attended in presence of COAS accept the last one that was set up by Lt Gen NS Malik of the BJP ESM cell.
1. With the NSA Mr Ajit Doval.
2. With Mr Nripendra Mishra Spl Secy in PMO
3. With JS PMO Mr.Anurag Jain
4. With HM Shri Rajnath Singh.
Trend of Proposals The trend of discussions nitially followed the same proposal as that of pre independence day. Since UFESM did not rescind from their stand of “No acceptance outside the definition of OROP as accepted by Parliament” ,the government gradually started relenting and started giving counter proposals. These are summarized as below: -
1. Instead of insisting on base year being 2011 they would consider the base uyear as 2013-14 as per vote on account & finance bill 2014.
2. The pay out date be pushed forward from 1/4/14 to 1/4/15
3. There would be no provision of review of pensions except at the time of deliberations of successive pay commissions.
These were rejected outright as unacceptable in totality.
In the next round with Spl Secy PMO the following was proposed.
1. Instead of insisting on base year being 2011 they would consider the base uyear as 2013-14 as per vote on account & finance bill 2014.
2. The payout date be pushed forward from 1/4/14 to 1/1/15. UFESM accepted considering from 1/6/14.
3. There would be no provision of review of pensions except at the time of deliberations of successive pay commissions.
Once again the UFESM members walked out.
The latest round was held on 27 Aug with JS PMO and government came down to the following lines.
1. Instead of insisting on base year being 2011 they would consider the base uyear as 2013-14 as per vote on account & finance bill 2014.
2. The payout date be pushed forward from 1/4/14 to 1/9/14.
3. There would be a provision of review of pensions once every five years against the proposal of once a year or once at least every two years.
The UFESM retracted its offer of acceptance of payment from 1/6/14 and rejected this proposal too. The underlying reason being the review of pension yearly or once in two years is the heart and soul of the OROP proposal. As of today all escalation points have come into immediate effect.
This is for Information of all veterans and could be passed on to various groups and sites as deemed appropriate. The above has been authorized for release by Gp Capt VK Gandhi VSM as desired by the Principal advisors of UFESM.
Col Anil Kaul,VrC
Media Advisor
UFESM
28 Aug 2015.
(Source- Via E-Mail)
The way the bargaining is going on, the bureaucracy proved themselves that they can become a very good fish market dealers selling fish at bargaining prices to entire country. The country can gain much if this bureaucracy is given such fish market jobs where they can prove to be best dealers with their bargaining capacities. Let political lot learn from this. We the defence people never bargain like the bureaucrats. Let PM and DM understand this technique by their babus. How can a wakil sab function as FM, does his know the basics of market? PM should understand this point.
ReplyDeleteLooks like merchants and customers haggling over prices
ReplyDeleteWhat a graceful and grateful way of civil servants negotiating with their own veteran soldiers. UPSC should also be complimented for selecting such talented negotiators as the backbone of Indian administration.
ReplyDeleteFM is only a mouth piece of bureaucrats and hence does not require formal qualification on the subject matter
ReplyDeleteRevision of pension every year It is not a problem at all. Once they can calculate DA twice in a year, along with the july Da calculation they can very well add 3% of basic pension and leave it problem over. It is nothing but the government simply avoiding and confusing everyone. They know all these things but intentionally they want to ignore. Why are they facing this much struggle instead they can stop defence forces selection, you can save more money. No need of salary , arms procurement pension and OROP.
ReplyDeleteThe government has said that the yearly equalisation of pension is not practical and it may be accepted once every five years. Will the Babus confirm if the benefits of NFU are received once every five years , one year or within a mont ?. IESM may match the period of equalisation as per the NFU terms in stead of once in two years. Fair!!
ReplyDeleteUFESM needs to do SWOT analysis urgently to avoid any harm to the brothers ESMs and take a pragmatic decision acceptable to the majority as Babus with the full support of FM are succeeding in painting the ESMs as unreasonable. Now that it is almost apparent that DM has almost accepted that his views have no weightage, FM is openly hostile and also he only is the decision maker of OROP and PM is not a descendant of RAGHUKUL to keep his promise, take a fresh look at the current situation with priority being the safety of ESMs on extended Hunger Strike.
ReplyDelete