Armed forces raise concerns in 7th Pay Commission with defence ministry

New Delhi: The armed forces have raised concerns over the recommendations of the 7th Pay Commission, including “shortcomings” in it, with the defence ministry, Navy chief Admiral RK Dhowan said today. He said the Commission’s report has been examined and effort is on to ensure that whatever they feel is “necessary” for the officers and men of Army, Navy and Air Force, is made available to them.[caption id=“attachment_1485115” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Admiral RK Dhowan. PTI[/caption] “Whatever we feel are the shortcomings are being taken up by the three services with the Ministry of Defence to see that whatever we feel is necessary for our men, our officers, our civilians, is made available to them,” Dhowan said during his annual press conference in New Delhi. He said that all issues of “concern” are being taken up with the ministry. The Navy chief was replying to a question on the discontent in the armed forces, especially at the level of officers, on the recommendations of the 7th Pay Commission. Officers say that if the Pay Commission is implemented in the present form, it will position them much below their civilian counterparts in terms of salaries, facilities and status. One of the main grudge that the armed forces have is with regard to risk-hardship matrix. The officers say that a soldier posted in Siachen Glacier, which has the highest degree of both risk and hardship, gets an allowance of Rs 31,500 per month. In contrast, a civilian bureaucrat from the All India Services draws 30 percent of his salary as “hardship allowance” when posted anywhere outside the comfort zone. Under the new scale, a senior IAS official posted in a city in North East will draw much more as “hardship allowance”, compared to the Rs 31,500 per month drawn by military officers in Siachen. PTI