Shock treatment for war
heroes' families
By Nirmala Kannangara
Wasanthaa Kumarapola is a war widow since a
decade ago. She had picked up the pieces of
her shattered life with difficulty and
learned how to support her two young
children. As a single parent, it is her duty
to support the children with her husband's
salary and the meagre income she makes as a
craftsperson in Ruwanwella. The past 10
years have been anything but easy with her
struggling to make ends meet while educating
her children.
But Wasanthaa was in for shock treatment
last week when she received the cheque for
her husband's salary with a massive
deduction of Rs. 8,200. She had no clue that
her husband's salary was now to be shared
with his parents.
She received no communication from the
authorities informing her of the deduction
of her late husband's salary to pay part of
it, 25% to be exact, to his parents. She
simply received Rs.8200 less, a massive
amount to a mother with two children to
support.
TheNext of Kin (NOK)of a member of the armed
services who dies on operational dutyor due
to terrorist action is entitled tothe pay
and allowanceshad the deceased lived up to
55 years.
Shocked
"The least they can do is to inform us. It
was a shock to see the slashed payment. The
bills keep increasing and our children need
more money for their education. It is one
huge struggle," she lamented.
This was also the plight of Sakuntala
Gurudeniya whose husband died 12 years ago
in Kallady. He was 31 years old when he
died, and since then, she has supported her
only daughter with the Rs.27,000 paid to her
every month as his salary.
What is more, their in-laws too have not
been informed of any such payment being made
to them. Nor have they received any money.
It is then that a few war widows decided to
verify matters from the Sri Lanka Army (SLA)
and learned about a decision to provide 25%
of a war hero's salary to the parents (if
they are alive) while paying the remainder
to the widow including child support.
When contacted, the parents of war heroes
too said that they received no money though
their daughters-in-law have made inquiries
from the Army Headquarters only to be told
that this is a new decision to split the
salary and pay one fourth to the parents.
Confusion
The confusion lies elsewhere. (See Box for
MCNS release)
As confusion reigns amongst the families of
war heroes, their widows and parents claim
that some of them lost their loved ones over
a decade ago and are protesting that new
schemes jeopardise their monthly budgets
that are carefully planned to cover
essential costs.
What transpires now is that the scheme has
been wrongly implemented. As per the cabinet
decision approved by President Mahinda
Rajapakse, the diversion of 25% of the
salary towards parents applies only to those
who died in action since November 2007, and
not a day before.
With widows blaming the Logistics and
Statistics Division of the Army Headquarters
for the mess-up, they also request the issue
to be urgently addressed so that their lives
need not be affected by sudden changes.
In the meantime, armed forces personnel
bemoan the lack of coherence and policy in
granting housing loans to them, alleging
that procedures have changed making them
wait for months on end to obtain their loan
facilities.
"When they speak, they say we are to be
facilitated in every way. We used to raise
housing loans through the respective
departments which was convenient and quick.
But now like everyone else, we are also
subjected to the regular procedure. Only the
interest rate is low," a soldier speaking to
The Sunday Leader on the basis of anonymity,
said.
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Parents
of married "heroes" entitled to 25% of
pay and allowances
The Media Centre for National Security (MCNS)
on Thursday (28) reported that parents
of married heroes will be entitled to
25% of pay and allowances.
'Under these conditions, parents of an
unmarriedmember of the armed forces are
entitled to the pay and allowances. At
present, a widow is entitled to the
entire pay and allowances of the
deceased. However, ifa married member of
the armed services is killed in action,
the parents are entitled only to
Rs.50000 and that too if the income of
theparents isless than Rs.2000. This
amount has been considered insufficient
consideringthe efforts of the parents
who wereresponsible forbringing upthese
heroes who died in action to protectthe
sovereignty and territorial
integrityofthe motherland.'
The MCNS reported that a
committeeconsisting of representatives
of the Finance and Planning Ministry,
Ministry of Public Administration and
Home Affairsas well aschiefs of thearmed
services reviewed thescheme of pay and
allowances ofmarried members of the
armed services who died in action on
duty in operational areas and
recommended the following.
1.To pay 25%of the pay and allowances to
the parents of such service person
2.To pay 25% of the pay and allowances
to the parents of deceasedin the case of
the widow remarrying.
3.To pay 75% of the pay and allowances
entitled to the widow for 10 years as
compensation. If the widow of the
deceased wishes to marry again an
emolument of 50% of the 75 % entitled
for10 years to be paid as
compensationwhile the balance 50% to be
paid to the guardianof the children.
4.The children of either the widow or
widowerentitled to compensationhave been
raised up to 26 years.
(Source: MCNS)
Regular
policy applies on loans
While confusion rages about the mode of
applying for a housing loan by security
forces personnel, Additional Secretary,
Defence Ministry, Sunil Sirisena claims
that they too have to apply for housing
loans like any other category of
government servants.
The facility of applying through their
respective armed service no longer
applies, he explained.
He explained to The Sunday Leader that
although earlier it was possible for the
armed forces personnel to obtain housing
loans from their respective departments,
the government policy has been changed
recently. Under the new scheme, they
have to obtain housing loans from banks
as per Finance Ministry and Central Bank
regulations.
Some concessions have been granted,
despite the revision of policy,
explained Sirisena. Accordingly, the
interest rate for a Rs.500000 loan
facility will be 4%, for a loan of Rs. 1
million or less, the interest rate for
the first Rs.500000will remain at 4% and
the second half will be at 8%.
Sirisena added that for the Rs. 1
million loan, the interest rate would
still remain at 4% for the first
Rs.500000 while the second half it would
be at 8% and above Rs.1 million it would
be 12%.
According to Sirisena although the army
mistakenly deducted 25% from war widows'
February salaries it would be corrected
at the earliest as the 25% deduction was
applied to those whose husbands were
killed after November 23, 2007.
"To pay 25% of war heroes' salaries to
the parents was decided as there were
numerous requests from the parents that
they have become helpless since their
children's sudden demise. Although we
decided to give all parents the 25% from
their child's salaries we found out that
it was not practical since the sample
survey carried out by the Defence
Ministry clearly showed that 99% of
total war widows in the country are on
loans. Hence we decided only to deduct
the proposed 25% from those who have
died after November 23, 2007," added
Sirisena. |
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