There have been a number of references online as to how, during the period when provisions of IV CPC and V CPC were in force, armed forces officers, who had been overlooked for promotion to the select rank of Lt Col/Cdr/Wg Cdr, were denied the basic entitlement of the full rank pay of the ranks of Lt Col (and equivalent) on being given the corresponding Time-Scale ranks.
This subject has recently got attention in the context of the Rank Pay litigation. So, it would appear, these former colleagues, who had fallen afoul of the infamous promotional pyramid, and the sometimes less than rational rules and processes that define which officers would continue to stick onto the pyramid walls and which ones would plunge to career-doom, were further deprived of their dues even after losing seniority and picking up the payscale a couple of years after their peer-group.
Judging from the amount of exposure the issue is now receiving on various blogs, it is indeed surprising why the matter was not taken up right when it arose. In fact, the role of services HQs relating to these issues is far from transparent. No matter how much blame gets heaped on the bureaucracy and the audit set-up, it is hard to understand how the whole rank-pay matter arose in the first place. Till date we have the rather unconvincing assertions of those who were at the helm, so to speak, to the effect that a very favourable fixation was obtained by them for officers of the armed forces at the time of IV CPC. We now know how far removed that view is from reality considering the manner in which all armed forces officers were deprived of what was their due and how litigation had to be resorted to obtain a resolution of the major issue.
But specific to the issue of rank pay applicable to TS ranks, one is even more puzzled as to why a simple issue was not resolved at the level of services HQs and Ministry of Defence right from the time of implementation of IV CPC. This blog post can merely link up various references to the matter so that this issue can receive attention, suggestions as well as discussion as to whether the matter needs to be taken up independently of the major on-going rank Pay litigation.
Chronologically, as rank pay was introduced by the Government at the time of implementation of recommendations of IV CPC, but independent of it, the confusion arose because probably the CPC OR the implementation authority needlessly arrogated to itself the authority to define what rank pay would apply to some one given the rank of Lt Col (and equivalent) on completion of the requisite length of service. At the most, IV CPC could have defined that officers holding the Lt Col (TS) rank would be accounted against Maj vacancies in the establishment.
If one really thinks clearly about it, perhaps even such a clarification from a pay commission, or in documents implementing the recommendations, was redundant and ought to have been left for the Government to define in other instructions and orders. To obtain further clarification, I had sought to raise the subject in a blog-post by RDOA by way of a comment. It also affected the time scale rank of Col for the period 16 Dec 2004 to 31 Dec 2005. But, at the time, I was wrong in assuming in the comment that a similar error would apply to Col(TS) post VI CPC. I understand now that it does not. A Col(TS) was given the same Grade Pay as a Col (select) with effect from 01 Jan 2006.
The error, or let's call it 'mischief', was further compounded at the time of V CPC which clearly laid down the different rank pays for 'Select' and 'Non-Select' ranks. This was inspite of the fact that a one-time grant of payscale of Lt Col was given to Officers who were given the Time-Scale rank. The fact that, by definition, rank-pay is integral to the pay-scale and the nomenclature of the corresponding rank was ignored on the basis of totally needless confusion created by flawed logic that because the time-scale officers were to be accounted against Maj vacancies they should get the rank pay of Maj. In other words, the non-select officers would be given the rank and the corresponding pay-scale but not the rank-pay defined by these two.
Blogs of Harmed Forces and RDOA had mentioned that the Govt. of India had reviewed the matter and "clarified" the definition of Rank Pay vide a letter dated 29 February 2000. But it remains unclear to this day whether any corrective action, representation or litigation exists in connection with this matter. It is surmised that the DGL on the total rank pay matter, issued by the services HQs, does rectify this anomaly, but that whole issue is now part of a contempt proceedings. It may not really hurt to share information whether there is a possibility to address this matter, independently of the contempt action, based on the Govt letter a link to which I had provided here.
{Edit}: Further reading on the subject on this Blog Post.
Chronologically, as rank pay was introduced by the Government at the time of implementation of recommendations of IV CPC, but independent of it, the confusion arose because probably the CPC OR the implementation authority needlessly arrogated to itself the authority to define what rank pay would apply to some one given the rank of Lt Col (and equivalent) on completion of the requisite length of service. At the most, IV CPC could have defined that officers holding the Lt Col (TS) rank would be accounted against Maj vacancies in the establishment.
If one really thinks clearly about it, perhaps even such a clarification from a pay commission, or in documents implementing the recommendations, was redundant and ought to have been left for the Government to define in other instructions and orders. To obtain further clarification, I had sought to raise the subject in a blog-post by RDOA by way of a comment. It also affected the time scale rank of Col for the period 16 Dec 2004 to 31 Dec 2005. But, at the time, I was wrong in assuming in the comment that a similar error would apply to Col(TS) post VI CPC. I understand now that it does not. A Col(TS) was given the same Grade Pay as a Col (select) with effect from 01 Jan 2006.
The error, or let's call it 'mischief', was further compounded at the time of V CPC which clearly laid down the different rank pays for 'Select' and 'Non-Select' ranks. This was inspite of the fact that a one-time grant of payscale of Lt Col was given to Officers who were given the Time-Scale rank. The fact that, by definition, rank-pay is integral to the pay-scale and the nomenclature of the corresponding rank was ignored on the basis of totally needless confusion created by flawed logic that because the time-scale officers were to be accounted against Maj vacancies they should get the rank pay of Maj. In other words, the non-select officers would be given the rank and the corresponding pay-scale but not the rank-pay defined by these two.
Blogs of Harmed Forces and RDOA had mentioned that the Govt. of India had reviewed the matter and "clarified" the definition of Rank Pay vide a letter dated 29 February 2000. But it remains unclear to this day whether any corrective action, representation or litigation exists in connection with this matter. It is surmised that the DGL on the total rank pay matter, issued by the services HQs, does rectify this anomaly, but that whole issue is now part of a contempt proceedings. It may not really hurt to share information whether there is a possibility to address this matter, independently of the contempt action, based on the Govt letter a link to which I had provided here.
{Edit}: Further reading on the subject on this Blog Post.
