Delhi HC orders disability compensation to retired BSF officer with hearing loss
New Delhi: The Delhi High Court has directed the Union government to grant disability compensation to a retired Border Security Force (BSF) officer who sustained mild to moderate hearing loss in a 2001 IED blast while on duty in Jammu and Kashmir.
Pulling up the authorities for denying disability benefits to the petitioner, a bench of Justices C. Hari Shankar and Om Prakash Shukla held that the officer’s 42 per cent bilateral hearing impairment was directly attributable to the December 2001 blast.
The Justice Hari Shankar-led Bench said repeated medical assessments, including those of AIIMS and BSF medical boards, had consistently linked his disability to the service injury.
Ashvini Kumar Sharma, who continued to serve in the BSF until his retirement in 2018, had sought disability compensation under the Central Civil Services (Extraordinary Pension) Rules, 1939. However, his claim was turned down by the Staff Court of Inquiry (SCOI) on the grounds that it was filed belatedly.
The BSF contended that, in view of Rule 6(i)6 of the CCS (EOP) Rules, since the petitioner had sustained the injury more than five years prior to the date of his application, he was not entitled to disability compensation.
In its judgement, the Delhi High Court found these rejections unsustainable.
“The manner in which the petitioner’s claim has been dealt with is a matter of concern. We do not wish to second-guess the reason as to why the petitioner, who was a war veteran who had suffered 42 per cent hearing loss attributable to an injury borne by him on the warfront in 2001, has had to wait for 24 years as of date for obtaining his entitlement,” the bench observed.
“The petitioner cannot be expected to approach the respondents (authorities) with a begging bowl, asking for his due entitlement under the Rules. It was for the respondents, in fact, to have released the petitioner’s dues on coming to learn of the fact that the petitioner had actually suffered disability which was attributable to the injury borne by him in 2001,” it added.
The Delhi High Court directed the Union government and BSF to grant disability compensation, calculate arrears from the date of issuance of the suitability certificate with 9 per cent per annum interest, and release the amount within two weeks. “Given the manner in which the petitioner has had to suffer despite the injury that he bore in 2001, we would have been inclined to award punitive costs in this case. However, as we have awarded interest on the disability compensation granted by us, we refrain from doing so,” the bench said.