SC chides government for denying pension to wife of soldier who died on LoC

NEW DELHI:A soldier, who was part of 'Operation Rakshak' and deployed near LOC in J&K lost his life in extreme climactic conditions, while discharging his duty in the wee hours of a chilly Jan morning in 2013 but his widow was denied Liberalised Family Pension (LFP) despite getting order in her favour from armed forces tribunal in 2019 as Centre moved SC and the litigation went on for five more years.

Rejecting the plea of Centre and defence ministry and ordering them to grant her LFP, SC Tuesday took strong exception of govt for not taking a sympathetic view and dragging the widow in court for protracted legal proceedings to deny her rightful and imposed a cost of Rs 50,000 to be given to her.

LPF is given in case of death of an armed forces personnel under certain circumstances and eligible family is entitled to pension equal to reckonable emoluments last drawn. Govt denied LFP on grounds that it was a case of 'physical casualty' and not 'battle casualty' where LPF is granted to the family. The commanding officer in this case had categorised the death as a 'battle casualty', and later it was changed to a 'physical casualty' which was challenged by the family.

After examining records and rules, a bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Augustine George Masih said govt had wrongly denied the widow the pension as the death happened as a result of war-like situations and it comes within the ambit of 'battle casualties'.

"Thus, the death can be attributed to illness caused by extreme climatic conditions. Hence, as per clause 1(g) of Appendix A of the Army Order 1 of 2003, the case will fall in 'battle casualties'. The reason is that the deceased was operating near LOC in extreme climatic conditions. He was part of 'Operation Rakshak'. The casualty caused by illness due to climatic conditions is covered by clause 1(g). In this case, the respondent's husband was a victim of illness caused by extreme climatic conditions," the bench said.