16 years after discharge, Supreme Court upholds grant of disability benefits

About 16 years after her husband was discharged from the Army because of a medical condition, the Supreme Court has upheld the orders of the Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT) that had granted special family pension to the widow on account of her husband’s death from cancer, along with disability pension to the soldier for the duration he was alive after leaving the Army.

Tarsem Singh, hailing from a village in Bilaspur district of HP was serving in the Mahar Regiment when he was diagnosed with cancer. Despite chemotherapy, he continued to serve, but when he was ultimately released from service, his disability pension was rejected on the grounds that his medical condition had been declared as “neither attributable to, nor aggravated by military service” by the Release Medical Board.

His widow approached the AFT citing law that if a disability incurred during service, then it was deemed to be aggravated by military service because of the stressful conditions under which all soldiers serve.