One Rank, One Pension (OROP) Scheme

02 Apr One Rank, One Pension (OROP) Scheme

One Rank, One Pension (OROP) Scheme – Today Current Affairs

Why in News?

The central government’s decision on One Rank, One Pension (OROP) for defence forces has been upheld by the Supreme Court. 

Today Current Affairs

About OROP:

• A uniform pension has been provided to the defence forces personnel retiring in the same rank having the same length of service, irrespective of their retirement date.
• The decision to implement OROP was taken by the Government of India in 2015, and the benefits for the same to be effective from 1st July, 2014.
• It has been done to bridge the gap between the rates of pension of the current and past pensioners at periodic intervals.
• The Pension of the past pensioners would be fixed on the basis of pension of retirees of calendar year 2013.
• For all pensioners the Pension will be re-fixed based on the average minimum and maximum pension of personnel retired in 2013 in the same rank and with the same length of service.
• The Pension of all those shall be protected who are drawing above the average.
• As far as the arrears are concerned, they are supposed to be paid in four equal half yearly installments.
• The persons of family pensioners including those who receive Special and Liberalized family pension and Gallantry award winners to be paid arrears in one installment.
• The pension to be re-fixed every 5 years.
• The Department of Ex-Servicemen Welfare, Ministry of Defence will be acting as the Nodal Implementation Agency.
• The OROP is not paid as a separate element as it is an integrated part of pension.

Issues associated with the scheme : The Hindu Analysis

• The Grant of full OROP will bloat the government’s pension bill.
• There exists issues in passing all the benefits.
• It may lead to similar demands from other government employees, especially paramilitary forces.

About the OROP case : The Hindu Analysis

• According to the petitioners in the course of implementation, the OROP principle has been replaced by ‘one rank multiple pensions’ for persons with the same length of service.
• They also argued that the initial definition of the OROP was altered and instead of an automatic revision of the rates of pension, the revision now would take place at periodic intervals. Today Current Affairs
  
• Moving from automatic revision is arbitrary and unconstitutional under Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution.
• According to the government , both ‘same rank’ and ‘same length of service’ were necessary conditions for availing OROP benefits.
• Rejecting the argument, the Supreme Court held that “OROP definition is not arbitrary”. The Hindu Analysis
  
• It said that the definition of the OROP is uniformly applicable to all pensioners irrespective of the date of retirement and the cut-off date is used only to determine the base salary for the calculation of pension.
• Further it went into the “principles governing pensions and cut-off dates” and said there is not a legal mandate that pensioners who held the same rank must be given the same amount of pension.

Today Current Affairs

Considering all the above provisions it can be concluded that the people below the average were brought up to the average mark whereas those withdrawing above average will be protected and further such a decision lies within the policy choices.

In this article we mention all information about One Rank, One Pension (OROP) Scheme  Today Current Affairs.

Vivek Raj