Revision of Casualty Pension Awards for Pre-2006 Armed Forces Officer and JCOs/OR Pensioners: Clarification
It appears that there are some misinterpretation/confusion about Para 3 of PCDA (Pension) Allahabad circular No. 569 dated 19.10.2016 which is clarified that earlier vide Annexure No. II of MoD letter No. 200847/Pen-C/71 dated 24.02.1972, there was a provision that Service Element War Injury Pension will be equal in amount to the normal retiring pension of the rank held at the time of disablement for maximum service of rank. It means Service Element of War Injury Pension was admissible for maximum term of engagement subject to restriction that War Injury Pension should not be more than last pay drawn. Prior to 6th CPC the Service Element/Service Pension was given 50% of the reckonable emoluments for 33 years Qualifying Service (QS) including weightage and for lesser period it was proportionately reduced; but after evolution of 6th CPC provision, concept of pro-rata reduction has been dispensed with. As per 6th CPC orders, pension will be 50% of the last pay drawn irrespective of QS. Therefore, relevance of maximum Term of Engagement becomes obsolete. The minimum guaranteed pension after 6th CPC was initially determined in terms of PCDA (Pension) Allahabad circular No. 395 and further modified as per circular No. 547 and 548 for JCOs/OR and Commissioned Officers respectively. The minimum guaranteed pension was calculated as 50% of the minimum of fitment table for 33 years of QS including weightage with pro-rata reduction of lesser period.
The minimum guaranteed disability element/war injury element was not covered in the MoD letter dated 03.09.2015; hence MoD letter 18.05.2016 was issued for revision of Casualty Pension awards for pre-2006 and clause of pension upto maximum Term of Engagement in case of war disabled pensioners which was admissible prior to 6th CPC was omitted in both the above circulars of minimum guaranteed pension. Therefore, there was a need to clarify this issue and hence Para 3 inserted in circular No. 569 after MoD letter dated 30.09.2016 for delinking of QS of 33 years for revision of pension under minimum guaranteed pension, Para 3 of circular No. 569 has become redundant and same may be treated as deleted.
After implementation of 6th CPC and also in 7th CPC, pension will be determined on basis of 50% of last pay drawn irrespective of QS, so the relevance of pro-rate reduction for lesser QS become redundant as full pension is admissible for each QS in each rank. Therefore, pension upto term engagement has also been redundant. The pension as per OROP rate was based on the live data of 2013 retirees where pension was given as per 6th CPC provision. Demand of pension upto term of engagement has also become obsolete. This issue may be dealt with accordingly and the pensioner approaching for this may be clarified on similar lines only stating that pension upto term of engagement in case of war disabled pensioner in OROP as well as 7th CPC revision is irrelevant. PCDA (Pension) Allahabad circular No. 604 dated16 Aug 2018 refers.
