Nurpur, May 5

The Ex-Servicemen Self-Help Cell, established by the Nurpur War Memorial Committee on the premises of the Sainik rest house in February last year, is successfully rendering services in addressing pension-related issues of the ex-servicemen of the lower Kangra region.

The president of War Memorial Committee, Col DS Mankotia (retd), said every Wednesday and Saturday, two members of the committee were assisting the beneficiaries from 11 am to 3 pm. He said the self-help cell was required as there was acute shortage of manpower in the office of the Deputy Director, Sainik Welfare (DSSW), Dharamsala.

"Ex-servicemen of the area have to repeatedly visit the DSSW office for the authentication of their pension documents before these were dispatched to the Army record offices. However, this cell will now rectify errors (if any) in the pension documents and the beneficiaries will have to visit the DSSW office only once for the authentication of documents," he added. The War Memorial Committee has also released two helpline numbers — 88948 45994 and 94590 58805.

As per information, a few years ago a Welfare Officer (WO) from the office of the DSSW, Dharamsala, used to visit Nurpur to handle pension-related issues and collect documents of the ex-servicemen for further processing at the Dharamsala office. In the absence of any assistance for the preparation of requisite documents and guidance on behalf of the WO, the ex-servicemen of the area were facing a lot of problems in addressing the pension-related issues.

The WO had also stopped coming here during the Covid pandemic, leaving the veterans in lurch.

Keeping in view the rising problems of the ex-servicemen, the memorial committee came forward to assist the ex-servicemen and established the self-help cell in Nurpur.