Minutes of Virtual Meeting of the Core Committee of TSEWA held at 1000 hrs on 15 Feb 2021
The following members attended:
- Brig CS Vidyasagar President, in Chair
- Cmde Sudheer Parakala Vice President
- Col Dr GB Sethi General Secretary
- Maj Gen SN Mukherjee President TSEWA, West Bengal
- Col NS Bhandari President, Coastal Karnataka and Goa
- Cdr Chandrashekhar Member
- Cmde Ashok Kota Member
- Lt Col VRS Ramana Reddy Member
- Lt Col Dr. K Bhaskar Reddy Member
- Maj Dr. B Bhikshapathy Member
- Mrs Rekha Sekhri Administrator, TSEWA Blog
The President welcomed all present in the meeting and thanked them for their efforts to attend the virtual meeting. He requested the General Secretary to commence the proceedings.
Points of Discussion
Item No. I. Annual General Body Meeting: General Secretary informed that next AGM will be held in the month of Jun 2021. No agenda points have been received so far. New team of TSEWA Executive Committee shall be formed during the AGM. President Brig CS Vidyasagar informed that General Secretary will request the members present at the AGM for volunteers for the committee and election will be held if more than one nomination is there for any appointment. However he suggested the following members for the committee:-
(a) President – Cmde Sudheer Parakala
(b) General Secretary – Lt Col G Parvathesam
(c) Treasurer – Maj Dr. B Bhikshapathy
Item No. II. TSEWA Office Building: General Secretary informed that they could not send the bulk SMS for donations but, could communicate with about 8000 members and donations of Rs 81000/- have been received from 12 members. Core Committee discussed the requirement of purchasing the building at the earliest and decided on the following committee to look in to the matter.
(a) Presiding Officer: Cmde Sudheer Parakala
(b) Members: Lt Col G Parvathesam
Maj Dr. B Bhikshapathy
The Committee shall be responsible for the following:-
(a) Selection of the Flat/House
(b) Formalizing the agreement with the builder
(c) Deciding the advance to be paid
(d) Preparing the SOP for payment of the balance of amount to the builder
Cmde Sudheer Parakala informed the suggestion of few TSEWA members to write the names of donors on each room/ hall of new office building. Core Committee accepted the proposal of writing the name of each donor in the hall who donates amount more than Rs 25000/- or so and that rooms will be named after the donors who sponsor the amount required for the room.
Further, it is decided to hire a temporary office building and give up the existing one in Bhaskar Rao Nagar, which is to be vacated by 28 Feb 2021. The building was identified by Lt Col G Parvathesam and rent is Rs 7500 pm. He also suggested that this building being closer to his home in ASR Rao Nagar, he will be able spend more time in the office. The President sought permission of Col Dr GB Sethi to allow 143 Vayupuri as our first office, as is being presently done.
Item No.III. Meeting with Honourable Raksha Mantri & Chief of Defence Staff: Col NS Bhandari. President Coastal Karnataka and Goa, has informed that they had interacted with Gen Bipin Rawat, CDS and Sri Rajanath Singh, RM, during the air show, Aero India 2021 at Bengaluru and found both of them as very cordial and receptive for ESM welfare. The CDS listened to the grievances of veterans led by Lt Gen Kamath in which Col Bhandari was also a member. A copy of points projected was handed over to CDS. Col Bhandari says that CDS was very receptive and appreciated the grievances of the veterans. The point of TSEWA was raised that Special Family Pensioners and Liberalised Family Pensioners be given compassionate appointment as Min of Def has about 5.50 lakh civilians being paid out of defence budget. CDS sympathised more with Special Family Pensioners as they are the ones who need compassionate appointment. Whereas Liberalised Family Pensioners, he stated get cash compensation or grant of Rs 1.50 crores and get the same pension as their husbands had they lived. Three NCOs were also formed part of the delegation but unfortunately each of the NCOs projected their own personal problems eating away meagre time allotted for detailed discussion.
There was another meeting with the Hon’ble Raksha Mantri. He listened to the grievances of veterans patiently. He assured to have a meeting with ESM in Delhi in May or Jun 2021. The following subjects were discussed and are hopeful of positive developments:-
(a) Compassionate appointment of family member of deceased member of Armed Forces who die in harness.
(b) Report of One Man Judicial Commission (OMJC).
Item No.IV. Functioning of NCESMO: General Secretary expressed his concern about non functioning of NCESMO and requested Brig CS Vidyasagar, Vice President of NCESMO, to initiate action for election of new team for NCESMO. Maj Gen Shibnath Mukherjee informed that all efforts are being made to form State Confederation of WB but there was not much response from various districts. The President informed efforts should be made by members of NCESMO to make state chapter of NCESMO. He assured he will write to Brig Kartar Singh on this issue. He will also request Presidents of TSEWA in various states to interact with other ESM associations and convince them to form state chapter of NCESMO. When we have all 28 states and 8 UTs have state / UT chapter of NCESMO, then only the dream of Col TN Raman who initiated the concept of Confederations will be fulfilled.
Item No. V. Allotment of Land for TSEWA Office Building by Government of Telangana: Col NS Bhandari suggested to approach Government of Telangana for allotment of land and that funds could be sought from MPLADS. President informed that there are hundreds of ESM organizations in Hyderabad and Government is not likely to give any preferential treatment to TSEWA. Even regular meetings of Rajya Sainik Board are not being conducted. In this scenario, we cannot hope for allotment of land for TSEWA.
Item No. VI. Arrangement for Virtual/ Physical Meeting of Core Committee: Maj Dr. B Bhikshapathy suggested to continue the virtual meetings even after the Covid Problems are over, so that members from other than Secunderabad / Hyderabad also can attend the meeting. Core Committee accepted the proposal and decided to have the necessary arrangements to be made for conducting the meeting of members, who are physically as well as virtually present for the meeting.
Item No.VII. News Letter: Maj Gen Shibnath Mukherjee, President WB suggested that a Newsletter of all activities of TSEWA be published quarterly for general awareness of the good work being done by TSEWA. It was decided that the next Newsletter will be issued around the AGM time as decided earlier. Earlier on his own initiative, Col CRR Sastry used to make newsletter which was very informative to all members.
There being no further points, the meeting was closed at 12:10 PM.
Brig CS Vidyasagar (Retd)
President, TSEWA