One Rank One Pension

One Rank One Pension

One Rank, One Pension (OROP), or same pension, for same rank and for the same length of service, irrespective of the date of retirement, was the basis for determining the pension and benefits of Indian Armed Forces till 1973.

In 1973, the Indian National Congress (INC) government headed by Indira Gandhi, Prime minister, following the Third Central Pay Commission , in an "ex-parte" decision terminated OROP. The termination of OROP caused disquiet in the Armed Forces and has since become a cause of public protests by Armed Forces Veterans.

An all party ten member Parliamentary Panel, known as the Koshyari Committee after its Chairman, examined OROP. The Koshyari Committee blamed the delay in implementing OROP on bureaucratic resistance and apathy."The Koshyari Committee unanimously found merit in OROP, and recommended its early implementation.

OROP, an increasingly politicised, and often a misunderstood and misrepresented issue, in the run up to the Indian general election of 2014, found favour with the INC, and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The top leaders of these parties, including Sonia Gandhi of INC, and Narendra Modi of BJP, made repeated public commitments to implement OROP

The defence pension budget for 2015-16, which includes about 4,00,000 defence civilians, is 54,500 crores. Defence civilians, which includes the entire civilian bureaucracy in the Ministry of Defence, retire at 60, are mostly based permanently in Delhi, and are not be covered by OROP. It is alleged by ex-servicemen organisations that defence civilian bureaucracy, led by the Defence Secretary, has opposed grant of OROP.

Concept of OROP

The KC, after taking into consideration evidence and oral deposition by witnesses, defined the concept of OROP as follows:

OROP "implies that uniform pension be paid to the Armed Forces Personnel retiring in the same rank with the same length of service irrespective of their date of retirement and any future enhancement in the rates of pension to be automatically passed on to the past pensioners."

The concept includes "bridging the gap between the rate of pension of the current pensioners and the past pensioners, and also future enhancements in the rate of pension to be automatically passed on to the past pensioners. In armed forces, equality in service has two components, namely, rank and length of service.

The importance of rank is inherent in armed forces as it has been granted by the President of India and signifies command, control and responsibility in consonance with ethos of service. These ranks are even allowed to be retained by the individual concerned after his/her retirement. Hence, two armed personnel in the same rank and equal length of service should get same pension irrespective of date of retirement and any future enhancement in rates of pension be automatically passed on to the past pensioners. "

Finding and recommendations

The ten member Koshyari Committee unanimously found that "there is merit in the demand for One Rank One Pension by Armed Forces Personnel". It strongly recommended that, "Government should implement OROP in the defence forces across the board at the earliest and further that for future, the pay, allowances, pension, family pension, etc in respect of the defence personnel should be determined by a separate commission so that their peculiar terms" are properly taken into account

The Inherit Point is that when the salary of a Major A in 1980 is not the same as the salary of a major B who retried in 2010 . How can their pension be the same if be the same if both served for 25 Yrs and retired as majors .

The Government Should also not try to woo the voters by false promises for which they neither have the Intent nor the Money