The Calcutta High Court Tuesdaydirected the Centre to release freedom fighter pension to two widows, whose husbands had fought for the right since 1981.A division bench comprising Chief Justice Debasish Kargupta and Justice Sampa Sarkar ordered the central government to start paying them pension, as admissible to widows of freedom fighters, within three months of receiving a copy of the order and to pay arrears since 1981.It was stated before the court that Ekadashi Bhowmick and Tapan Karmakar had participated in an uprising against the British Raj from 1942 to 1943 when an independent government was established at Tamluk in undivided Midnapore district of West Bengal.The independent government, named Tamralipta Jatiya Sarkar, existed for 18 to 19 months from 1942, their lawyer Ramdulal Manna said.The government had raised two forces - Bidyut Bahini and Bhagini Nivedita Bahini - members of which destroyed all official records of the British Raj at Tamluk.The Government of India had introduced a Freedom Fighter Pension Scheme in 1972 for those who had an annual income of less than Rs 5,000, Manna said.In 1981, a liberalised pension scheme 'Swatantrata Sainik Samman Pension' was introduced, which did not impose any bar on annual income to receive the honorarium.According to the scheme, records of incarceration or case files would act as proof, in the absence of which a certificate by another freedom fighter, whose records were approved, could also act as proof, the lawyer submitted.The district magistrate of Midnapore had said in 1981 that no official records of the period from 1930 to 1946 were found, Manna said.A freedom fighter, Rabindranath Giri, certified for Ekadashi that he had taken part in the freedom struggle during 1942-44 at Tamluk and he applied for the pension on September 29, 1981.The central government rejected the prayer of Bhowmick and Karmakar who had also applied under similar circumstances, which they challenged before the Calcutta High Court.Karmakar died on December 4, 1988, Manna said.In 2002, the high court directed the Centre to grant pension to Bhowmick and also to the widow of Karmakar on similar grounds.Their applications were again rejected for erroneous documents.This was challenged by Bhowmick and Renubala Karmakar again before the high court.In the meantime, Bhowmick died on September 6, 2010.Bhowmick's widow Tulsi Rani and Karmakar's widow Renubala had substituted them as petitioners to fight the case.On March 24, 2017, the high court set aside the rejection orders and directed formation of a committee comprising an official each of the central and the West Bengal government to look into the issue.Challenging the formation of the committee, Tulsi Rani and Renubala moved an appeal before the chief justice's court.During pendency of the appeal, the committee submitted a report contending that records of the said period was available, but the names of Bhowmick and Karmakar did not appear in those.On November 11 this year, Chief Justice Kargupta directed the SP of East Midnapore district to be personally present in the court with the said records on November 27.SP Solomon Nesa Kumar informed the court Tuesday that no official record could be found for the period from 1930 to 1946, Manna said.Having found that the contention of the petitioners were right that the records were not available, the division bench directed the Centre to release the pensions of Bhowmick and Karmakar to their widows.
