“Something rotten in the state of Denmark” … The Fiefdom of Controller General of Defence Accounts
Chief Justice Shri DY Chandrachud along with Justice Shri PS Narasimha and Justice Shri Pardiwala were hearing the well known OROP case. The CJI lashed out at the Attorney General for presenting a sealed envelope to the court, as the Govt reply. He refused to accept the sealed envelope and instead asked the Attorney General of India to read it or take it back.
“We will not take any confidential documents or sealed covers, and am personally averse to this. There has to be transparency in court. This is about implementing the orders. What can be the secrecy here?” he said, adding that he wanted to put an end to the sealed cover business.
“It can be resorted to only when it is about a source or endangering someone’s life”, DY Chandrachud said. He further said that the court sees the government’s difficulties on payment of OROP arrears to ex-service personnel, but needed to know the plan of action.
The Attorney General then read the report. The letter said “Budget outlay is not able to meet this huge outflow at one go. Resource is limited and expense needs to be regulated. The finance ministry was taken into confidence, and it has said it is unable to meet this outflow at one go,” he said.
The top court, on March 13, came down heavily on the government for “unilaterally” deciding to pay OROP dues in four instalments. The defence ministry has recently filed an affidavit and a compliance note in the top court, giving the time schedule for payment of the arrears of ₹ 28,000 crore to ex-servicemen for years 2019-22.
The Supreme Court has finally allowed time to the Union government to make staggered payments of OROP arrears to ex-servicemen by February 28, 2024, as the Centre said it faced a huge outgo of ₹ 28,000 crore, and payment of it at one go could have serious implications for defence management.
The court ordered that OROP arrears since 2019 would be payable to those earning family pension and gallantry award winners (total 6 lakh persons) by March 30, to more than 70 yr-old ex-servicemen (around 4 lakh) by June 30, and rest (10-11 lakhs) in on August 31, November 30 and February 28.
CJI DY Chandrachud-led bench said though it was upset with unilateral letter by defence ministry for payment of OROP arrears in instalments in breach of the Supreme Court judgment to pay by March 15, on perusing the difficulties, it feels the national interest must not be lost sight of.
Well in the overall scenario we feel that the morale of the Soldiers both serving and retired is of the highest National Interest and not mere payment amount of Rs 28000 crores. The present day ESM are those who had fought and survived, to protect the nation in 1965 war, 1971 war, Kargil operation, Siachen, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Counter terror operations in J&K and Counter Insurgency operations in North East. The family pensioners are those whose husbands / sons / fathers gave up their lives for the Nation.
Therefore the question asked should have been WHO ALL ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR ALL THIS? And why they should not to penalized heavily?
When the Cabinet had given its decision on OROP with effect 2014,the then Raksha Mantri Shri Parrikar had it implemented in spite of the “Gordian Knot of the Accountants “. The Govt decision was also that OROP will be reviewed every 5 years.Hence the next review was due with effect 01Jul 2019.
However some BRIGHT SPARK somewhere, came out with an idea that next review was due only in 2021. So who was the bright spark who changed the decision of the cabinet and most important… approved the order issued to PCDA (Pension), Allahabad for carrying out review of pension only with effect O1 Jul 2021. The culprit needs to be pinpointed. The Veterans need to know the REASONING followed by the Financial “pundits” for coming to this conclusion. Also on what basis the Raksha Mantri accepted the advice of the Accountants?
Next once the ESM fraternity went to Court to fight for their rights,then who were the set of advisors to the Defence Secretary and the Raksha Mantri? they need to be identified because they should have also started planning for the Scenario of Court ruling against their Action..which is exactly what the Court ruled.
So why the Defence Secretary, Financial Advisor Defence, Controller General of Defence Account along with concerned officials of Finance Ministry did not take appropriate budgetary action to accumulate the required amount for each FY 2019 -20, FY 20-21, FY 21-22 and FY22-23? In that case Rs 28000 Crores would have been available without any burden. The morale of the Soldiers the most important of NATIONAL INTEREST would have not been stressed so badly, instead would have remained well protected.
In fact the most surprising thing is that why no detailed calculations were done by PCDA (Pension) with effect 01Jul 2021 (the date given by the BRIGHT SPARK)? The dispute in the court was covering only the period 01 Jul 19 to 30 Jun 2020.
So even while the case was going on, new OROP should have kicked started from 01Jul 2021 automatically. Why this was not done?
Even if the above action was pending, the budgeting should have continued. All arrears would have been paid, right after the Supreme Court gave its final judgement on the Case last year.
After all, the Armed Forces keep planning for various contingencies and therefore are able to act the fastest in the worst of scenarios. They maintain reserves etc for such purposes. Why rest of the MoD paraphernalia is averse or immune to this practice?
Therefore there is definitely something rotten somewhere.
It is the Indian Defence Account Service which is responsible for ensuring that the current political and financial OROP kind of imbroglio does not happen. This Cadre presently has 565 officers out of whom 02 are in Apex pay scale (same as Army Commanders pay grade17), 03 in HAG+ pay scale (same as senior Lt Generals pay grade 16), 29 in HAG pay scale (same as Lt Generals pay grade 15) and 96 in Senior Administrative Grade (pay grade 14 same as Major Generals) comprising 24% of the Cadre and other 76% of the Cadre down below in JAG(Selection Grade –pay grade13 same as Colonels), Junior Administrative Grade (pay grade 12), Senior Time Scale (pay grade 11) and Junior Time Scale(pay grade10).
The BRIGHT SPARK is unlikely to be an Officer from JAG scale or below.
Smt Rasika Chaube is currently heading the IDAS and is the Financial Advisor / Secretary Defence Finance, in the Ministry of Defence. She took over her appointment on 01Jul22 and is also holding the additional charge of CGDA with effect 01Oct 22. It implies that presently the office of the CGDA is headless. Though Overall the BUCK STOPS at the door of Defence Secretary and the Financial Advisor they cannot and should not be blamed totally. We need to delve much deeper.
One Smt Madhulika P Sukul was the CGDA with effect 01 feb18 till 21 aug18. Review procedure for OROP 2019 should have started in her time. Next the post remained vacant and then most surprisingly Mr PK Nayak became the next CGDA only from 22 Apr 19 to 30 Apr 19 that is precisely just 9 days !!!
Next came Mr Sanjiv Mittal who became CGDA on 01 May 2019. Curiously this 1984 batch officer was given only a Good grading (below average grading) pertaining to year 2015-2016 i.e. 01.04.2015 to 30.09.2015 and 01.10.2015 to 31.03.2016. For the first quarter of 2015, the Reporting Officer graded him 9.5 assigning special reasons therefor, whereas the Reviewing Authority downgraded it to 7.
Similarly for the second spell, i.e., 01.10.2015 to 31.03.2016, the Reporting Authority graded him 5.45, whereas the Reviewing Authority graded him 7. At that time he was serving in the Ministry of Defence on deputation. The Report had also been vetted properly in the Finance Ministry,
However Mittal went to Court where his Mid Term Performance Appraisal Report (MTPAR) was set aside by Justice L Narashimha Reddy on grounds of technicalities. The appraisal had not been reviewed in the prescribed time. Subsequently he became the CGDA. Then on 04 Mar 21he was appointed the Financial Advisor to Ministry of Defence. This was the period when that bright idea was given by some BRIGHT SPARK.
Both as CGDA and FA the BUCK crossed Mittal’s POST before stopping at the post of Defence Secretary.
Mr Rajnish kumar took over as the CGDA only on 26 Jul2021 and served till to 30 Jun2022. The post of CGDA has remained vacant since then? Why? Is the Govt making a deep selection and trying to fix the rotten state of things?
Another office from where the bright idea regarding the 2019 OROP Review could have originated is the Principal Controller of Defence Account (Pension) Prayagraj. Here the PCDA (Pension) from 20 May 2019 to 15 Nov 2020 was Mr Vishvajit Sahay. He should have quarried his predecessor regarding the work done on OROP Review and reported the matter to CGDA if nothing was done till then. He should have started preparations of new payment tables on war footing.
Next came Mr Rajiv Ranjan as the PCDA (Pension) from 01 Dec 2020 followed by Mr MK Sinha with effect 01 Aug 2022.
Once the next CGDA is appointed then he should go deep and identify THE BRIGHT SPARK. The new CGDA has to implement the Supreme Court’s order by the given date and then get cracking to ensure that the Jul 2024 OROP Review is flawless and implemented with Pension disbursed on 31 Jul 2024.
The Adjutant General and his counterparts in IAF and Navy, Secretary Department of ESM, Financial Advisor MoD, Defence Secretary, the three Vice Chiefs, the three Chiefs and the Chief of Defence Staff must keep up to date on the OROP REVIEW 01 Jul 2024.
Also the Raksha Mantri this time should be watching like a hawk. He cannot afford to let down the ESM this time. They will be demanding a progress report from Raksha Mantri to the nation in general and the Armed Forces and ESM in particular prior to the announcement dates of Lok Sabha Elections 2024.
