Antony pitches for two key pay demands of Services, pulls up Navy chief again

New Delhi, October 5: Navy chief Admiral Sureesh Mehta, who sent out an unclassified signal on September 24 to all naval officers and ranks on withholding implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission salary recommendations, is learnt to have been pulled up again by Defence Minister A K Antony for the manner in which he, as Chairman of Chiefs of Staff Committee, led the other two chiefs — General Deepak Kapoor and Air Chief Marshal Homi Major — in virtually attacking the establishment.

This is the third time Admiral Mehta has been pulled up by Antony in recent months — earlier, he was pulled up for his remarks over the build-up of Chinese submarines.

It is learnt that while Antony has agreed to look into grievances, even push in Parliament the “demands” of the armed forces over pay, he is upset by the way Admiral Mehta dealt with the matter. After being almost nudged by Admiral Mehta to “refuse” implementation of the pay panel report, the armed forces did not submit their revised salary slips to the Ministry’s accounts office.

Antony is part of a three-member panel — the others are Pranab Mukherjee, the panel head, and P Chidambaram — tasked to look into the pay anomalies. On September 26, he had an uncharacteristic tough talk with the three chiefs. He is now said to have conveyed to Mukherjee that the Government has agreed in principle to the Services’ demand for restoring 70 per cent “extant pensionary weightage” to jawans on the basis of their last drawn pay.

The pay commission had recommended that the jawans be given 50 per cent “pensionary weightage” and had provided an option of lateral entry into paramilitary and Central police forces. But the armed forces wanted the lateral entry scheme approved and implemented by the Government before effecting the recommendation for 50 per cent “pensionary weightage”.

Underlining that there will be no pensionary loss to jawans, Antony is said to be pushing for upgrading the pay band of Lt Colonels and their Navy, IAF equivalents — Pay Band-4 instead of Pay Band-3.

The other “demands” were for uniform grades of pay at par with civilian officers, placing Lt Generals in the Higher Administrative Grade plus scale.

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World of Fogs by Yogi Singh on 2008-10-06 15:57:33.665667+05:30
Losers, weepers!!!

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Antony pitches for two key pay demands of Services, pulls up Navy chief again by Ranjana on 2008-10-06 11:02:09.994331+05:30
Its unfortunate that the Mr Antony is behaving like a frustrated juvenile,after allowing the situation to deteriorate to this level.Instead of pulling up the chiefs he should urge the PM to initiate an inqiury to investigate the bunglings of the Babus who on their own decided to get themselves more increments beyond the approval of the cabinet.

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Pay demands by Premchand on 2008-10-06 09:50:41.40912+05:30
One cannot blame the army chiefs for the stand they took. The political establishment is prone to overlook or delay matters and Mr.Antony is no exception.

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Antony pitches for two key pay demands of services by murty on 2008-10-06 08:00:19.8223+05:30
Thats agood show by Navy chief.The civil administration understand nothing but defiance.They see no sense in the requirement of Armed forces.Once the defiance started they dont know what to do.The cunning beaurocrats shamelessly can cheat the Armed forces once again.Watch out for their next cunning act

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babu by victor on 2008-10-06 07:47:24.732013+05:30
This time the editor does not want to put his name against the article , thats some development. What is right is right .Unfortunately the politician has been made to believe that there interest are being looked after the Babu but the day he learns that he is putting his interest even above the country leave alone the politician the matters will improve but it will take long time , the malaise has set in hard to thaw it will require blow torch or maybe a furnace

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Antony Pulls Up by Cdr. P V Francis I N (Rtd) on 2008-10-06 07:10:37.125669+05:30
Admiral Metha is not going to be cowed down by any kind of "telling off" That is the hall mark of a true naval officer If proded further He will resign and so will the two other chiefs It is sad but this could very well happen After all the chiefs are answerable to their men and cannot go back with a half empty bag to their men and so, can officers not go back to their families and say after all the noise this is all we got The nation too badly brainwashed by the Babus and Politicians to understand a grave situation when it going to happen I think it is high time the nation started listening to the Armed forces they are the best judges of what is good for them.

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Military pay by K. Vijayakumar on 2008-10-06 06:30:09.435452+05:30
At a time when the UPA government has nothing going for it, even the nuclear deal, a quarrel with the Service Chiefs should be the last thing it should want. But vinasa kale viparidha buddhi!

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