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HAPPY VETERANS DAY

 

HAPPY VETERANS DAY

 

LT COL NOEL ELLIS

 

15/I/2023

 

It was Veterans Day yesterday. May I wish each and every one from our fraternity good luck, good health, good spirits, and God Speed always.

 

Let me start by a disclaimer. I write this with no malice to anyone. You may agree, disagree or be indifferent to my views, but let me pen them for all those who can read between the lines and may relate to what I say. I am a very happy person by nature and always look at positives. So here goes.

 

Yesterday, I had the proud privilege to being invited to the Veteran Days function in the Army Cantonment. Believe you me, I was bubbling with excitement. Lots of preparations went in. My wife almost told me to get out of the house.

 

Where is my side cap & miniature medals? Why has the Cherry blossom gone dry? Why is the Brasso so liquidy etc. Finally, where is some abbreviation given as the venue to attend the function located. Thank God my course mate saved me from embarrassment.

 

Timing was calculated with a ten-minute cushion, just in case one got lost between TCP 1 and TCP 2 as I don’t visit the cantt much. I don’t even go to the CSD canteen until ‘they’ scare us that you have to prove to be alive to draw canteen stores. Jeevan pramaan for picking up Rum. Bhai kuch log peetay hain to jeetay hain and vice versa. Agar peetay nahi to pilatay to hain. Unless he has kicked the bucket having one too many for the road.

 

It was nice to introduce oneself to so may esteemed veterans. Various stalls related to ECHS, Veterans cell and others including a medical camp, just in case someone feels uneasy during the function. It was nice to see veterans, with nice, curly Jodhpuri style moustaches. The swell in the chest was visible, even within me. Some handshakes and we entered a beautiful auditorium for rest of the proceedings after a cup of tea.

 

It was after a long time that one had the privilege to see a power point presentation. One had a comfortable seat in the third row. Reminded me of Staff college, where before the speaker used to take the podium, people used to accuse me of snoring too loud, disturbing their sleep. I held my eye lashes open before I slipped into nostalgia.

 

The impression I got that the organisations looking after the veterans is too over burdened with the workload of approx. 1.30 lakh people on their roll. Must be tough.

 

While in the fauj we were ‘BABUed’ by the Army clerks. If your clerk was good, he would get even forty rupees claim from CDAO, otherwise your claims could keep going back and forth. If not BABUed then you were ‘CDAOed’. Well, both of them were left behind ages back.

 

Then we were NETAed by several pay commissions. We kept demanding OROP & NFU. Never mind if lakhs died before getting their entitlement. After all the veteran’s fraternity is increasing by about 60000 annually. What a burden on the nation!

 

Now that we are progressing digitally, we were ‘RODRAed’, rather ‘Rogered’ then ‘SPARSHed’ and now I hear a new ‘Bhasoodi’ called ‘OASIS’. After we hang our uniform, we now would have to look for this watering hole after picking up our ‘Quota’ from the CSD.

 

We all misuse the CSD was another inference I drew. Or else the present entitlement shall be reviewed, if CSD stuff is found in the civil street. Dear Sirs, get your vigilance in place and book such veterans and make a ‘namoona’ out of them.. Why give mass punishment to the rest. I am sure more than 90% veterans are honest. Why punish the fraternity at large?

 

In any case, Big Bazar, Reliance Fresh etc offer better, cheaper and more variety of products. Courteous behaviour which is missing, of the canteen staff both civilian and the uniformed dealing with ESM should also be looked into by the organisation, is a point to ponder.

 

I am dreading the day when I shall migrate to SPARSH or whatever that stands for. Though we were told to cooperate as there are always teething problems. People have their regiments recorded wrongly, the dates of births of children have gone to the 1900 so on and so forth. People did not receive their pensions, as banks no longer entertain the traditional submission of life certificate etc. The ‘Ram Baan’ solution as claimed is no where in site.

 

I have been a beneficiary of the ECHS. I am lucky to walk on earth still. My next dilemma is that many of us have been ECHSed too. Funds have been a problem, digitisation has been an issue when we shifted from a 32k bit card to the 64k one. What I understood was that there are 501 different reasons for the cards to be blocked. I was looking for one reason why shouldn’t this card work seamlessly across the country in every hospital.

 

Issue of medicines is an issue. Claiming reimbursement for medicines is another issue. Half of the medicines are NA. The only thing which caught my mind during the briefing was the red tape and hierarchy which every application has to go through. That  may take months to be rejected, rather than be taken care of. The online thing doesn’t work properly for reasons best know to the company the software has been outsourced too. Patience is running out.

 

 

A new abbreviation caught my attention. Some VERMIN or something. Moment, I saw it, I started laughing. My eyes got watery and before I could wear my specs and understand the acronym the slide changed.

 

Veterans of all the forces had appeared in large numbers. What their expectations were? We would never know.

 

The positive which I took away was that I met some long-lost friends.

 

Can there be a system, where before we are ‘Verminised’, all his documents are sorted. I wonder!!!!!!!!

 

JAI HIND

© NOEL ELLIS

 

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