Families of all paramilitary jawans killed in action to receive ₹35 lakh

The Ministry of Home Affairs has increased the financial aid for the families of jawans of central armed police forces killed in action.

“The MHA has desired that payouts in ‘killed in action’ cases may be made uniform across all CAPFs at ₹35 lakh in a phased manner,” an official communication said.

Almost all forces have issued orders to increase financial assistance to ₹35 lakh for next of kin of those killed in action.

This aid will be applicable with effect from November 1, 2021, but financial assistance in all other circumstances of death will remain unchanged.

“This [fund] is only for jawans killed in action during encounters, gunfights, etc. For all other scenarios, the amount would be the same or decided by the DG,” a BSF official said.

“Forces used to decide as per their financial planning but that is now uniform,” a Central Industrial Security Force (CISF) official said.

An ADG-level official said the forces used to decide the risk fund at their level. The highest amount was given by the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) while few forces were paying 40-50 per cent less from the risk fund to the family members. “Now, it has been fixed to ₹35 lakh for all CAPFs.”

Earlier, the amount of risk funds was different across all paramilitary forces.

In CRPF, this risk fund was increased from ₹21.5 lakh to ₹25 lakh by the directorate general.

Similarly, CISF, which is mostly deployed at airports, had ₹15 lakh as risk funds.

Indo-Tibetan Border Police had ₹25 lakh for jawans killed in action.