Date:30/08/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/08/30/stories/2008083056150800.htm

National

Antony announces more benefits for ex-Servicemen

Special Correspondent

To set up panel to recommend welfare schemes

Second sainik school inaugurated in Haryana
It will start functioning from next academic year

CHANDIGARH: Union Defence Minister A.K. Antony on Friday announced that after opening a new department in the Union Ministry of Defence for ex-Servicemen, the Central Government would soon set up an ex-Servicemen Commission to recommend various welfare schemes for the ex-Servicemen and their families. He disclosed that after removing the anomalies in the recommendations of the Sixth Pay Commission, which was being implemented from September 1, about Rs.6,000 crore more had been earmarked for the serving defence personnel and ex-Servicemen.

Mr. Antony made this announcement while laying the foundation stone of a sainik school at Gokhra village in Rewari district. This would be the second sainik school in Haryana. He said the new school would start functioning from the next academic year with about 120 boys initially in Class VI and VII. He also assured that the construction of school building and appointment of the staff would start at the earliest.

Mr. Antony said Haryana was the “fastest developing” State of India and had been contributing the maximum number of soldiers to the armed forces. Other states in the country should follow Haryana in formulation and in implementation of the welfare schemes for the serving soldiers, e x-Servicemen and their dependents, he asserted. Underlining the need to channel the energy of the youth with discipline, he said: “Sainik schools are today one of the major vehicles of carrying forward the movement of mass discipline in our society.”

Meanwhile, Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda urged Mr. Antony to open a military school at Matanhail village in Jhajjar district, the foundation stone of which was laid by the then Union Defence Minister George Fernandes.He thanked Congress president Sonia Gandhi, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Mr. Antony for fulfilling the longstanding demand of the school and said that Haryana had become the third State in the country after Bihar and Karnataka to have two sainik schools. Mr. Hooda said his government was fully conscious of the welfare of the serving soldiers, ex-Servicemen and their dependents and Rs.28 crore was being spent on implementation of various schemes for their welfare during the current financial year.

Union Minister of State for Defence Production Inderjit Singh, Union Minister of State for Defence M.M. Pallam Raju, Haryana Irrigation and Public Works (Building and Roads) Minister Ajay Singh Yadav and Bawal MLA Shakuntala Bhagwaria were among those present.