The Supreme Court recently ordered the Indian Army to pay a disability pension and arrears to a soldier who was released from service thirty-six years ago for suffering from seizures [Bijender Singh v Union of India & Ors]..A Bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan ordered the army to grant the disability element of disability pension to Bijender Singh at the rate of 50% with effect from January 1996 onwards for life. “The arrears shall carry interest at the rate of 6% per annum till payment. The above directions shall be carried out by the respondents within three months from today,” the Court ordered. Singh had claimed that he started suffering from seizures after his posting at Siachen Glacier. .The apex court reiterated that the morale of the armed forces requires absolute and undiluted protection and if any injury results in the loss of service without recompense, this morale would be severely undermined. It said that the law is now clear that if there is no note or report of the medical board at the time of entry into service that the member suffered from any particular disease, the presumption would be that the member got afflicted by the said disease because of military service. “Therefore, the burden of proving that the disease is not attributable to or aggravated by military service rest entirely on the employer. Further, any disease or disability for which a member of the armed forces is invalided out of service would have to be assumed to be above 20% and attract grant of 50% disability pension,” the Court underscored. .Singh had moved the Supreme Court against the orders of the Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT) rejecting his claim for disability pension. He had joined the Army in 1985 but was invalided out from service in 1989 on account of a disease called generalized tonic clonic seizure old 345 V-67. However, Singh argued that he was healthy when he joined the force and suffered this disability during his posting at the high-altitude Siachen glacier from May 1988 to September 1988.The medical board opined that the disability was not attributable to or aggravated by the military service. Three subsequent re-survey medical boards constituted in the years 1992, 1998 and 2002 assessed his disability between 15% to 19% and concluded that the he was disabled for life. Singh challenged his ouster before the AFT, which rejected his claim in 2016 and the review application was dismissed in 2018. .In its judgement, the Supreme Court noted that the AFT simply went by the remarks of the invaliding medical board and re-survey medical boards and did not examine the issue as to whether the disability was attributable to or aggravated by military service.The Court said that the disease for which Singh was invalided was not detected at the time of his entry into the service. “Thus having regard to the discussions made above, we are of the considered view that the impugned orders of the Tribunal are wholly unsustainable in law. That being the position, impugned orders dated 22.01.2018 and 26.02.2016 are hereby set aside,” the Court ordered. .[Read Judgment]
