Review of the Defence Pay Structure of Sixth Pay Commission

The Indian Armed Forces  have requested for the review of the Defence Pay in the Sixth Pay Commission which is likely to be submitted by the Review Commitee mid July 08.

While some demands are justified, it is clear that the SPC has taken note of the special service conditions and need to attract and retain talent and has given a generous award.

As noted by the commission, a parity exists between the pay scales of defence forces officers and civilian group A services, in particular with IPS. However, because of the special disturbance allowance, defence pay scales have had a slight edge vis-à-vis the analogous posts in the civilian side.

The disturbance allowance was granted in 1950 as a temporary measure. The Third Pay Commission noted that in view of the special facilities given to the defence forces personnel, there was no justification for continuing this allowance as a separate entity.

Yet, instead of abolishing it completely, the commission recommended that an element of the allowance be merged with the pay scales of defence officers. That gave the defence forces an edge over corresponding posts on the civilian side.

SPC has taken out this edge as a separate element and called it MSP, after enhancing the amount suitably. The commission claims that it has not only retained the edge defence salaries enjoyed but also added an element to compensate for the hardships associated with defence services.

Therefore, at the entry level, as on January 1, 2006 a lieutenant would now get a revised pay of Rs 21,000, on par with entry-level junior time scale (JTS) in the case of Indian Administrative Services (IAS) and Indian Police Services (IPS).

But the Rs 6,000 MSP that a lieutenant in defence forces would receive gives him a 28.6% higher salary than his civilian counterpart. A Major would get nearly 40% higher salary than the corresponding STS grade of the IAS. In fact, the difference would be higher as dearness allowance and all other allowances would be paid on MSP also.
As of now MSP is available only up to the rank of Brigadier.

Armed forces have demanded that MSP be extended to Major Generals and Lt Generals. The commission has, however, ensured that ranks above major generals and Lt Generals are adequately compensated. It has recommended that MSP that a Brigadier receives would be taken into consideration when he is promoted to Major General.

It has important subsequent benefits as while in the case of ranks below Major General, MSP would not count towards annual increments , in the case of Major General and above ranks, it would actually be included in the base for annual increments as it would then be a part of the band pay.

The defence person below officer rank (PBOR) are recommended an MSP of Rs 1,000. The defence forces have demanded that the amount be hiked to Rs 3,000. Indeed, the amount does appear to be low for jawans, but PBORs have also benefited from the proposed relativity vis-àvis civilian posts.