One rank, one pension: There will be good news soon, says Manohar Parrikar

New Delhi: Even as ex-defence personnel continue to agitate against the Centre over the ‘One rank, one pension’ scheme, Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar on Thursday said that ‘there will be good news soon’.

The OROP scheme has been a long-standing demand of retired defence personnel.

The Modi government has maintained that it is to OROP, a key promise made during Lok Sabha polls.

In his ‘Mann ki Baat’ address, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had assured ex-servicemen that his government would soon implement the OROP scheme.

Even though the government has said it is committed to implementing OROP, there has been no official word on why the scheme is getting delayed.

Close to 22 lakh ex-servicemen and over 6 lakh war widows stand to be immediate beneficiaries of the scheme, which envisages a uniform pension for the defence personnel who retire in the same rank with the same length of service, irrespective of their date of retirement.

Currently, the pension for retired personnel is based on the Pay Commission recommendations of the time when he or she retired.