Minutes of TSEWA Core Committee Meeting held on 23rd January 2019 at 143 Vayupuri Secunderabad – 500 094
The following attended:
- Brig CS Vidyasagar President in Chair
- Cmde Sudheer Parakala Vice President
- Col Dr GB Sethi General Secretary
- Col G Parvatesam Treasurer
- Gp Capt CRR Sastry Jt Secretary
- Col MJ Ganapathy Member
- Col K Bhaskar Reddy Member
The President welcomed all present and thanked the members for attending the meeting. He requested the General Secretary to commence with the proceedings with his points.
Points from General Secretary.
RM’s Meeting with NCESMO Delegates: General Secretary informed that intimation was received that a meeting of NCESMO delegates with Hon’ble Raksha Mantri is likely to be scheduled in near future and we need to compile some agenda items to be sent to President NCESMO for his action. Gp Capt CRR Sastry said, we can deliberate on the issues that merit inclusion and then finalise the agenda. General Secretary said that the agenda is to be sent by 27th January 2019.
Membership Landmark Crossed: General Secretary informed that recently TSEWA has reached a landmark when 10,000 membership was crossed and mentioned that this was achieved even before TSEWA completed four years. He complimented Col Sitaramaiah (Retd) and Hony Lt Venugopal of Cumbum, Prakasam Dist, Andhra Pradesh who sent membership forms for about 420 new members which enables us to reach this coveted figure. He said that substantial credit for this feat goes to Hony Capt B Joseph who used to travel month after month to Benguluru for enrolling new members. Gen Sec urged Presidents of TSEWA at various levels to explain to Ex-Servicemen in their area of responsibility about achievements of TSEWA to motivate them to our organisation. Strength lies in unity and numbers.
Legal Cases: General Secretary gave progress of legal cases as under:-
- AFT 28. Information was received that AFT 28 (Revision of basic pay of Majors and equivalents in service 6th CPC by equating pension from Rs 11,600 to Rs 11,925 in 5th CPC ) Army and Air Force OAs were filed with the AFT Delhi and are under scrutiny. AFT 28 Navy case is held up for want of a Lead Litigant from Delhi/NCR.
- AFT 1B. It is held up as we need to obtain new Vakalatnamas from all petitioners and also confirmations that they are alive as per requirement of AFT Delhi.
- BB2. Its appeal in Supreme Court came up for hearing.
Payment to our Advocate in AFT Delhi. Invoices were sent by our advocate in AFT Delhi for release of part of legal fees and requested the Treasurer to consider them for early payment.
Awareness Camp at ESM Locations: General Secretary suggested that we should make vigorous efforts to make the environment aware of the activities of TSEWA and was of the view that we should request the prominent active leaders in colonies of ESM to organise awareness camps in their localities so that their members are acquainted with their Pension entitlements and process by which any pension issues faced by them can be resolved. They can also be familiarised with the activities of TSEWA and how such activities are benefitting the ESM and Family Pensioners.
Exemption under Sec 80G of IT Act: The General Secretary said that many of our members have started making contributions to TSEWA. However, we require substantial donations to expand TSEWA activities and enhance its foot print all over. He hoped that when TSEWA is granted the exemption under Sec 80G of IT Act, the Donors will more forthcoming to make substantial donations to TSEWA and felt that we should make suitable appeal to Corporates and our own members seeking donations.
Points from Treasurer.
Donations from Members: The Treasurer informed that consequent to the appeal from our President, members made a donation of Rs 31,000 and we received Rs 1,00,000 from Sri Munikrishna. He said that henceforth he will publish the list of donors at the end of each month.
Progress of Court Cases handed over to our advocate in AFT Jaipur: He inquired the Progress of Cases (BB4 and AFT 29) and requested Gp Capt CRR Sastry to ascertain the progress.
Col Veeramani’s Case: He said that a new PPO that clarify the observations of CPPC of OBC was handed over to Manager of OBC Bowenpally, Secunderabad for onward transmission to the CPPC. The Branch Manager agreed to do the needful in the matter.
Newsletter Contents: He said that many of our members like Hav Harish Asthana, Hony Fg Offr AV Reddy and Hony Sub Maj KV Subba Rao have been working relentlessly to resolve the issues of our ESM and Family Pensioners. He said that we should capture their achievements in our Newsletter. Gp Capt CRR Sastry said that it will be done in the next issue of the Newsletter.
Refund of Legal Fee: He said that certain Applicants have requested for refund and the same was done.
Points from Cmde Sudheer Parakala.
Charity Cases: He said that funds permitting, we may consider making some grants to deserving candidates seeking assistance from TSEWA. The treasurer said that Charity to an extent of Rs 50,000 may be considered.
Points from President.
Possible issues to be included in next NCESMO meeting:The President threw open the forum for suggesting the possible issues that could be included in Agenda for the forthcoming meeting of NCESMO delegates with Hon’ble RM. After thorough deliberations, the Committee members felt since 10 issues were placed before the Hon’ble Raksha Mantri in the first meeting held on 27 Nov 2018, we should restrict the number of agenda points to not more than three or four. Mainly few concerns of ESM regarding are to be forwarded to Brig Kartar Singh (Retd), President NCESMO as under:-
(a) Functioning of ECHS. The ECHS though a boon for ESM and family pensioners is not able to meet the needs of ailing members. The problem of non availability of medicines in spite of enhanced powers of local purchase has not been fruitful. In certain ECHS polyclinics the OiCs powers of LP are exhausted within 10 days of the month forcing the ESMs to buy medicines from the market on payment. The concept of ALCs (authorised local chemists) though good has become very cumbersome due to paper work.
(b) Enhanced Rate of Ordinary Family Pension. Govt of India has sanctioned Enhanced Rate ordinary family pension upto 10 years from date of death of pensioner or 70 years of age whichever is lower. Enhanced rate of OFP is pension given to widow on death of her husband is same as the pension given to the ESM. This is to enable her to bring up her children. But the duration of Enhanced Rate of OFP is based on retirement age of civilian central government employees who retire at the age of 60 years. Therefore their children who are of age 44 years (70 years is age of death of pensioner-26 age of ESM when first child was borne) can avail this facility. The widow of such Civilian Central Government enjoy Enhanced Rate of Ordinary Family Pension when her children are much older as it is very rare civilian employees die before retirement. The same provision has been made applicable to faujis. In our case, our sepoys retire at the age of 35 to 37 years. In few cases, they die due to unnatural causes like motor vehicle accidents, electrocution during farming, disputes with neighbours, road rage etc. In that case the Enhanced Rate of Ordinary Family pension is restricted to 10 years from date of death. There are many family pensioners who are yet to bring up their children who are in the age group of 5 to 7 at the time of death of the ESM. Therefore to enable the family pensioner to give better quality of life, the provision of Enhanced Rate of Ordinary family pension should be enhanced to death of Pensioner to 70 years or till his youngest child attains 25 years which ever is earlier.
(c). Notification for authorising the equalisation of OROP from 1st July 2019 at the earliest. The maximum and minimum pension of all ranks till age of 33 years in intervals of 6 months as was done for OROP – 2013 is required to be made for OROP – 2018. The pension of ESMs who retired in the period of Jul 2018 to Dec 2018 is same. PCDAs could have easily found out the maximum and minimum pension of all ranks from e-PPOs by end of Aug 2018. A circular similar to Circular 555 showing pension of all Pre – Jun 2019 pensioners to avail benefit of OROP – 2018 could have been issued by now. As we know the PCDAs do not stir till the financial year 2018 – 19 is over as OROP arrears are to be paid if circular is issued now.
Gp Capt CRR Sastry agreed to make detailed agenda and circulate to all members for their review and finalisation.
There being no other points the meeting was closed at 10.45 am.
Brig CS Vidyasagar (Retd)
President, TSEWA