Defence services unhappy

SIXTH PAY COMMISSION REPORT

The first murmurs of protest over the Sixth Pay Commission recommendations are emanating from the defence services.

A senior defence services officer told Business Standard today that there were several anomalies in the report that needed to be resolved.

These include the fact that the Military Service Pay (MSP) will only begin from the date of acceptance of the award, possibly three months from now, even as their civilian counterparts will get salary arrears from January 2006 onwards.

"This gap of around two-and-a-half years will hurt the services. We have a joint services pay commission cell. We will write to them to take up the matter with the finance ministry," the officer added.

The Military Service Pay (MSP) is a fixed sum of Rs 6,000, meant to compensate officers from the armed services up to the rank of Brigadier, for the hazardous and arduous nature of their duties. Personnel below officer rank, who have been divided into three categories "" X, Y, and Z "" would receive Rs 1,000 per month as MSP.

The Sixth Pay Commission recommendations, submitted to the finance ministry on Monday, have said that allowances will be applicable "from the day the report is accepted".

Armed services officers want to be compensated for the interim period vis-à-vis their civilian colleagues. Officials added that there should be parity for personnel below the officer rank.

Officers also pointed out that while the pay commission report defines the MSP as a sum of money to alleviate hardship, it is a fixed amount.

The MSP represents nearly 25 per cent of the pay of the junior most officer in the services "" a Lieutenant "" but is barely 10 per cent of the pay of a Brigadier.

This quantification of arduous service conditions is one that officers are not happy with. They would have instead preferred a percentage-based MSP.

The services also feel that the upper pay limit for senior ranks "" Major General and Lieutenant General "" has been fixed at Rs 67,000. Earlier, Major Generals and equivalent were entitled to a salary of Rs 18,400-22,400. In the case of Lieutenant Generals, the pay band is the same but with a rank pay of Rs 11,000.

With the current level of 150 serving Lieutenant Generals in the Army alone, the fixed upper ceiling would suggest a level of income stagnation, more so as Major Generals and Lieutenant Generals are not entitled to MSP.

Having studied the Pay Commission report, the services say that the average increase in salary, excluding allowances, for the armed forces is around 33 per cent, compared with what officers are drawing today. Compared with the Fifth Pay Commission report (that does not factor in DA), the increase is 3.2 times.