Army chief calls age row personal, non-committal on moving court

New Delhi: Army chief General VK Singh today remained non-committal on whether or not he will move court to seek redressal on the matter of his age row. “It is a purely personal issue and I desist from making any public comment on the issue,” he told reporters when asked if he had kept the option open on approaching court to settle the dispute over his year of birth.[caption id=“attachment_177969” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“General VK Singh. Image courtesy PIB”]  [/caption] The question was asked in the context of the defence ministry rejecting his statutory complaint for not treating 10 May 1951 as his year of birth as against 10 May 1950. The defence ministry has twice rejected General Singh’s claim of accepting 10 May 1951 as his date of birth, which would have given him an extension of 10 months in office. Recently, Singh had said the idea of approaching the court on the age issue has not occurred to him. The army chief has two sets of date of birth in the records. The records with Adjutant General’s branch show it to be 10 May 1951 whereas the Military Secretary’s branch records it to be 10 May 1950. Asked if his differences with the ministry were over, Singh said, “When there were no differences at any point of time (on the age issue), how can they be now?” He was evasive when asked if the ‘chapter’ over his age issue was over, saying, “I don’t know whether the chapter was open or has been closed. This is a personal issue and I will not comment on it.” When pointed out that he had given interviews recently on his age issue, the army chief said, “That was part of army day fixtures. If somebody has breached the trust, you are there to ask… please ask your colleagues why it has appeared and what has appeared, I have got nothing to do with it.” PTI