One of the ex-servicemen fasting unto death for the One Pension One Rank implementation in India has been rushed to hospital in precarious condition.

Col. Pushpender Singh collapsed and with the 10-day deadline of ‘cooling off’ nearly over for the government to sanction the payment things look bleak.

The spearhead of the now 72-day old peaceful protest is Maj. Gen. Satbir Singh, who told Arab News that the cooling off period had been conceded to give the government time to examine the matter and give a deadline to the men and women in uniform.

“If, at the end of the 10 days they cannot come up with a solution, we may have to consider upping the protest,” he said. The issue has been hanging fire for 15 years and was first considered 30 years ago.

As we go to Press Col. Pushpender is in a stable condition but his life is still imperilled and if things were to go wrong it would be the first casualty in peace of a soldier, retired or otherwise, fasting to death since independence.

The three-point agenda is quite simple, really.

l Apology from the government for the police assault on elderly ex-servicemen and manhandling their medals which they were wearing.

l A deadline for implementing the OPOR mandate.

l No change or whittling down of the monies earmarked for the scheme.

Although the candlelight vigil in New Delhi’s Jantar Mantar area was more a memoriam for those who had lost their lives on the border the fact that Dehra Dun which is home to a sizeable retired service population has picked up the baton is ominous. There are so many cantonments in India where retired soldiers have established communities and one shudders to think of the consequences if this sort of protest spreads.

It is no longer a Narendra Modi-Arun Jetley issue nor is it an issue for grandstanding by any Opposition politicians. This is a national cross roads and they cannot go against the red light.

The ex-servicemen are getting more vociferous and their tonal value that much more aggressive.

It is incredible that the government can dilly dally on the promise and cause so much disaffection in the senior retirees that those in service will also feel the bruising.

This sort of protest has the potential to create its own fuel and push forward and will be detrimental to everyone.

India’s armed forces, though often taken for granted by the government in power and the bureaucracy are swiftly elevated to a pedestal when there is unrest on the borders or a rescue mission after a slap from nature. The armed forces have always responded with alacrity and put their lives in danger.

One can only hope that the Col. pulls through. If something were to happen to him, God forbid, the outcome would be catastrophic.

These elderly but stoic people are not giving in. Don’t hope that their back will break. And even if they did give up the chasm between civvy street and the uniform will have widened to a dangerous span ... Indians don’t want that, believe me.