Capt to Modi: Can’t you spare `9,100 crore for veterans
Friday, 24/07/2015
http://epaper.dailypostindia.com/Details.aspx?id=136130&boxid=58904&uid=&dat=2015-07-24
Chandigarh: Congress Deputy Leader in Lok Sabha Captain Amarinder Singh on Thursday hit out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, asking if his government can provide Rs 1 lakh crore special package to Jammu and Kashmir, what prevented it from sparing Rs 9,100 crore for one rank one pension (OROP) for the ex-servicemen.
In a statement here, he regretted the ‘long and unexplained delay’ in granting OROP to the ex-servicemen by the NDA government, despite the previous UPA regime ‘already having approved it’.
Reminding the PM of the promises he made to ex-servicemen over the issue during poll campaign, Amarinder said, “Now more than a year has passed since you formed government and the matter is perpetually and deliberately being delayed. This delay amounts to virtual denial.” He wondered whether an amount of Rs 9100 crore really matter for a country like India and that too when it was meant for our retired defence personnel.
The former Punjab Chief Minister said, the ex-servicemen have given their life for the country guarding our borders in most hostile conditions. “Most of them have spent their life entirely in Kashmir and a number of them sacrificed it for the sake of the country,” the Amritsar MP said while wondering as how could the government be so “insensitive” towards the genuine and justified demand of the veterans.
