I had touched on some aspects of the 7 CPC matrix in the previous post. I have always tried to reason for establishing some equitable basis of pension parity for older retirees given the reduction in years of service required to attain the same time-bound ranks as compared to earlier times.
With the arrival of 7 CPC recommendations and the still far from clear outcome of the fixation process under OROP, it can't hurt to try an make sense out of the prevailing confusion.
For the purpose of this blog post, I have tried to focus on older retirees in the ranks of Maj and Lt Col as they are most affected amongst officer veterans by the reductions over the years in service required for getting promotions based on length of service, putting them at a severe dis-advantage to current retirees in their erstwhile cadres and streams.
I have tried to co-relate the years of service now required to attain ranks on time bound basis as against the increments specified in different levels of the 7 CPC matrix. It becomes apparent, the number of increments attained by currently serving Officers for the same years of service is much higher than older retirees. So, for the same length of service, an older retiree would have fewer increments in the same level.
If the pension of an older retiree is fixed on basis of increments given to him in the corresponding pay-band,when he was in service, his pension could be equal to that of a current retiree with much less service than him. This could run totally counter to what OROP is supposed to bring about.
If the pension of an older retiree is fixed on basis of increments given to him in the corresponding pay-band,when he was in service, his pension could be equal to that of a current retiree with much less service than him. This could run totally counter to what OROP is supposed to bring about.
Then there is the old aspect of pension parities required with current retirees, with equal service, who get automatically migrated to higher Matrix levels, as compared to older retirees, due to faster time-based promotions (link to a previous blog-post introducing the need for pension parity points is placed at the bottom of this blog post). In this specific example, there is the issue of Majors who retired with more than 20 years of service and Maj/Lt Col who retired with more than 26 years of service.
To put the whole matter in, and I must stress this, a hypothetical table, I have assumed that level 12 A 11 of the matrix applies to the rank of Major and the first increment would start at a service of 7 6 years; Lt Col would be governed by level 12A, his first increment stage in Matrix starting at a service of 13 years and level 13 for Col must be seen to have the first increment stage at 16 15 years.
With these assumptions we can attempt to build a first approximation of how pensions ought to or can get fixed as follows (Table can be enlarged or made to pop-out) (Edit: Table was amended based on feedback)
{Edit: Here is a link to a blog post that tries to explain the justification for pension parity points for older and current retirees based on equal service and reductions that have taken place in service required for attaining the same time-bound rank.}