By IANS,
New Delhi: The Indian Army will observe 2011 as the year for its disabled personnel to honour the soldiers who have been rendered handicapped while serving the nation, its chief General V.K. Singh said Wednesday.
During 2011, the army would “concentrate only” on the welfare of disabled personnel and a number of programmes will be launched to this end, Singh told reporters.
“We are working out programmes under which we will give attention to all our disabled. It is not that we don’t do it now, but for one year we want to concentrate only on this particular aspect,” he said on the sidelines of a function to honour war widows and disabled personnel.
Asked about complaints from veterans on pension and other related issues, the army chief said the force has been working towards addressing the complaints and a database of ex-servicemen is being prepared at their regimental centres.
“Our endeavour is to prepare such a system that we can access the database of all the centres and after that see the shortcomings. And then send our personnel to these people and enquire about their problems and try to provide solutions for them,” he said.
The army chief and his wife Bharati Singh, who is the president of the Army Wives Welfare Association, handed over specially modified scooters to 14 disabled soldiers and provided monetary help to war widows.