Justice (Retd) L Narasimha Reddy, former Chief Justice of Patna High Court, will head the Judicial Committee which will look into the implementation of One Rank One Pension (OROP) scheme, it was officially announced here on Monday but the protesting veterans rejected it.
The Committee has been given a six-month deadline for submission of its recommendations. The Terms of Reference for the Committee shall be to examine and make recommendations on references received from the Central Government on various issues concerning the scheme announced by the government last month.
These include measures for the removal of anomalies that may arise in the implementation of the OROP as notified by the government on November 7.
He will also look into the measures for the removal of anomalies that may arise out of inter-services issues of the three forces due to implementation of OROP besides implications on Service matters.
The Committee will also look into any other matter referred by the Central Government on implementation of the OROP or related issues, a statement by the Defence Ministry said.
In a statement, the protesting veterans said “We reject the notification as it is one of the seven anomalies pointed out by us to government after issue of notification on OROP and repeatedly thereafter”.
They said that their recommendations on an inescapable commission, if at all, should be multi-member has been discarded.
“Paragraph one of the commission notification says it will consider “Govt references” only. Thus leaving the veterans high and dry. Also by doing so the door kept open with a mediator in the form of Gen (Retd) VK Singh has been shut on our face too,” they said.
The statement said the way forward is to approach the Supreme Court which would be taken procedurally as per the advise of their counsel Ram Jethmalani very shortly.