INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
CHANDIGARH: Directing the Army to grant special family pension to the widow of a Major found dead in a bathroom 23 years ago in a case of
to be taken by the competent authority in such cases, not bound by mechanical manner of disposal of cases, where a service personnel has
rendered almost a substantial part of his life to the Indian Army, but his family has not been granted benefit of a beneficial provision for
released on Thursday.A division bench, comprising Justice Rajendra Me non (Retd), chairperson, AFT; and Lt Gen CP Mohanty (Retd),
administrative member, principal bench of the AFT, New Delhi, passed the orders on a petition filed by Bindu Chadha, the wife of late Major
She was not granted the special family pension by the competent authority considering it to be a case of death as neither attributable to
nor aggravated by service.Chaitanya Aggarwal, the counsel for the applicant, submitted that Chadha was posted at the headquarters and was
performing duties, which led to hypertension, leading to his death, and it does not matter if hypertension was never detected when the
officer was alive.Aggarwal submitted that hypertension, which Chadha was suffering from, was attributable to Army service
Chadha served in various field and peace areas in different climatic conditions and there was continuous stress and strain of service, he
the officer was classified as physical casualty.It was added that the competent authority has considered the cause of death as neither
attributable to nor aggravated by the service.After hearing all the parties, the AFT said is indeed an irony that a service personnel
rendering crucial 12 years of his life to the Indian Army dies due to a disease which can no way be held as not attributable to the military
service by virtue of the fact that nothing was detected in the initial medical examination when he entered service.
