Seven years after he was decorated by the President with the Sena Medal (Gallantry) for showing conspicuous bravery in a gunfight with terrorists, a Deputy Commandant of the Assam Rifles has finally been granted the ‘Cash Award’ and ‘Annuity’ by Punjab and Haryana High Court which was refused to him by Haryana government.
Haryana provides a one-time cash award and annuity to gallantry awardees belonging to the state. However, the claim of Deputy Commandant Jasmer Singh Malik for Rs 10 lakh award and Rs 50,000 as annuity was rejected on the ground that he was not technically a part of the defence services but was a member of the paramilitary forces.
Challenging the rejection before the Punjab and Haryana High Court by basing his case on an earlier judgment in the matter of Commando Jasbir Singh, the officer had pleaded that Assam Rifles was a unique force which operated under the command and operational control of the Ministry of Defence and the Army but was funded by the Ministry of Home Affairs. He had contended that even the award itself was called “Sena Medal” which literally translated into “Army Medal” and which was conferred by the Defence Ministry for serving with the Army.
Agreeing with the contention of the officer, the High Court has allowed his petition and directed the State to release him the cash award and annuity. The Court has also observed that admittedly the Assam Rifles was an “Armed Force of the Union” and even the notification for the purposes of the gallantry award mentioned him under the heading “Army” and not under the “Ministry of Home Affairs”.
Sources in the Haryana government said that the resolution of the anomaly regarding differential treatment for award money with regard to Assam Rifles was pending since long and it was internally recognised that there should be no discrimination in releasing such benefits based upon the colour of the uniform since the idea behind the cash award was to recognise the bravery of a person for a particular award which had no link with the technical status of his parent service.
Sources said that there was delay in resolving this anomaly since earlier the Rajya Sainik Board was dealing purely with the Army, Navy and Air Force, but now the new “Department of Sainik and Ardh Sainik welfare” was committed to look after all uniformed forces and hopefully the issue would be resolved without litigation for any other similar rare case in the future.
