Guesstimates Of Rank Pay Arrears

Now that the pay disbursement authorities have started implementing their interpretation of the Govt. letter that, in-turn, interpreted the judgement of the Hon'ble Supreme Court on the Rank Pay case, there would be deviations from others' interpretations of the judgement or of the Government interpretations thereof, not to forget, from countless pipe-dreams and wishes of die-hard optimists who must have expected a bonanza of some description.
 
So, till the actual methodology of working out arrears becomes available in the public domain, one can but grope in the dark to snatch some reasonable estimate of what sort of inflows would result.
 
The one thing that appears fairly clear at present from the Govt. letter is that there's a strong possibility the re-working of emoluments would be guided by the following restrictions:
 
  • The re-fixation of BP, in the payscale, as on 01 Jan 86 would take place after reversal of the deduction, made at the time of IV CPC, of an amount equal to the rank pay applicable to the rank held by an Officer as on 01 Jan 86 eg the basic pay of a Maj fixed at 3400/- as on 01 Jan 86 could be refixed at Rs. 4050/- wef 01 Jan 86. Or, it might be as low as Rs. 3600/-.
  • Subsequent promotions would, probably, not entail a jump in BP equivalent to the rank pay of the next rank, though of course the higher rank pay would be applicable on promotion.
  •  
  • There would be no revision of the deductions of rank pay made at the time of V CPC. However, as the BP for Dec 95 would be higher due to revision of basic as on 01 Jan 86, the BP wef 01 Jan 96 might have to be refixed upwards by an amount equivalent to one increment in the V CPC scales.
However, it is not certain how the disbursement and audit agencies might choose, unless they have already chosen, to further restrict the dues of those affected. Just taking the bare minimal case of the Maj stated above, ideally, the arrears, for just the duration of IV CPC, ought to be on the lines estimated as follows:
 


Original BP Fixed For Maj On 01 Jan 86 By IV CPC
3400.00
Original BP Fixed For Maj For Dec 95 Due Initial Fixation By IV CPC
4650.00
Assumed BP Refixed Vide GOI  Ltr For Maj As On 01 Jan 86
3600.00
4050.00
Assumed Revised BP For Dec 95 Due Implementation Of GOI Ltr
4800.00
4950.00
5100.00
Arrears For BP And DA For IV CPC
43926.00
127137.00
Intt @ 6% For 7 yrs
18448.92
53397.54
If the major in the above example is lucky and/or wishes to be optimistic and assumes upward revision of BP for Dec 95 will result in re-fixation of BP for V CPC, then the following arrears could be “hoped for” as well
Original BP Fixed For Same Maj On 01 Jan 96 By V CPC
13500.00
Assumed BP Refixed Vide GOI  Ltr As On 01 Jan 96
13900.00
Assumed BP Revised As On DOR Due Implementation Of GOI Ltr
17100.00
(without any stagnation increment at end of scale)
V CPC Arrears For BP And DA As On DOR
97926.00 54000/-
Intt @ 6% For 7 yrs
41128.92 22680/-
{Edit: Arrears for V CPC have been amended as the original figures of  97296/- &
  41128.92/- represent the total arrears and intt. for both IV and V CPCs}
One does come across opinions that tend to dwell on the means that might be deployed to "short-change" the affected parties. In that line of reasoning, there may well be an attempt to restrict the enhanced revised BP of IV CPC to a level below the starting stage of the next rank in the IV CPC scale. An example could be that at, or after, the initial refixation on 01 Jan 86, the BP of a Maj would ultimately stagnate at 3800/- till the date he was promoted to Lt Col. In other words, in the example in the table above, the refixed BP of the Major would start at 3800/- and not Rs.4050/- even if the revised calculation yielded the latter figure. The BP would become 3900/- only on the date of promotion to Lt Col. This is a fairly dark and pessimistic view but it does bring us back to those increments vs scale-revision considerations of the past.

4 comments:

  1. I fail to understand as to how, stagnation of scale comes in the continuous Pay scale. Are there any reasons to take scale of Major, Lt Col or Col ? The scales should be extended to 5100 + Brig RP.
    Pl correct me

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    Replies
    1. I agree. The IV CPC scale is a continuous scale. But the starting rank stages have been defined in the payscale and the GOI letter is specific on the point that only the fixation has to be re-done for IV CPC and the scale stays the way it is.

      But the term stagnation is used in the table in the context of V CPC. Lt Cols who hit the top of the scale before retirement would still be drawing the same basic even if their pay fixation for V CPC now gets altered on account of the upward revision of the last BP for IV CPC (Dec 95).If stagnation increments had applied, those have not been taken into consideration.

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  2. The formula adopted by the CDA for working out the arrears paid to Major Dhanpalan,the pioneer and the torch bearer of this saga, may provide some clue to the thinking in the CDA.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. PCDA(O)provided a "clue" to their thinking as indicated by the link in this subsequent blog post
      .

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