New Delhi, September 27 The Manmohan Singh Government and the three armed forces chiefs reached a compromise on the implementation of the Sixth Pay Commission but not before Defence Minister A.K. Antony did some uncharacteristic plain-speaking.
On Saturday, the Centre set up a three-minister panel headed by External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee to examine the pay-related anomalies of the services and the defence chiefs agreed to send their revised salary bills to the Defence Ministry on Monday. But according to top sources in the Services Headquarters, before coming to the agreement on Friday evening, Antony made it clear to Army Chief General Deepak Kapoor, Navy Chief Admiral Sureesh Mehta and Air Chief Marshal Homi Major that the armed forces cannot unilaterally decide not to implement a Union Cabinet decision and that there was no way the UPA government would let them get away with it. What it meant was this: the decision of Admiral Sureesh Mehta—as reported by The Indian Express on September 26—to withhold the issuance of the government draft notification letter till the pay anomalies were sorted out, was breach of discipline.
Antony also told the three chiefs that the Defence Ministry would be forced to issue the draft letter if the armed forces failed to follow the directions of the Union Cabinet—this was a contingency plan that South Block had drawn up. There was no way, the three chiefs were told, that the officers and ranks would be denied new scales on October 1, 2008, along with their civilian counterparts.
After the three chiefs backed off, Antony said the pay related anomalies would be addressed by a panel that would have Mukherjee, Finance Minister P. Chidambaram and himself. Reopening the Pay Commission recommendation, he is learnt to have said, had larger implications as even the paramilitary forces and the police had grievances. Antony conveyed all this to the chiefs after talking to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who is currently in New York attending the UN general assembly.
Source: http://www.indianexpress.com/
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