The Delhi High Court recently ordered the government to grant disability pension to a retired Army Nursing Officer who was denied the benefit on the grounds of obesity and hypertension.

A Division Bench of Justices C Hari Shankar and Justice Om Prakash Shukla reversed the order of the Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT), which denied the woman’s claim for pension by drawing a connection between her obesity and hypertension without any medical basis.

“It is well known that every obese person does not suffer from hypertension, and every person who suffers from hypertension is not necessarily obese,” the High Court said. 

It held that the AFT’s order was ex facie contrary to the law laid down in this regard. 

“The Tribunal, in our respectful opinion, was not justified in drawing, of itself, a causal connection between the hypertension and the obesity form which the petitioner was suffering, where no such causal connect is noticed either in the opinion of the RMB [Release Medical Board] or even in the opinion of the specialist who had examined the petitioner,” the Bench said.

The Court passed the order on a plea filed by a retired nurse who joined the Indian Army in 1969 served for over 36 years.

She retired from service on July 31, 2006 in a low medical category. 

At the time of her release, the Release Medical Board (RMB) assessed her disability at 1–5% for obesity and 30% for hypertension, which qualifies for disability pension under the regulations. However, her application was turned down, prompting her to approach the AFT in 2018.

The AFT held that her hypertension was a result of obesity and therefore, not attributable to military service. It also relied on the fact that she had been advised to lose weight during service.

However, the High Court disagreed with these findings and said that the law is now settled that if a disability is not noted at the time of induction, it is presumed to have been caused or aggravated by military service unless the medical board clearly attributes it to another cause.

In Tripathi’s case, neither the RMB nor the specialist who examined her provided any reasoning to establish that her hypertension was caused by obesity, the Bench underlined. 

Therefore, it ordered the government to release the petitioner's disability pension with arrears.  

Advocates AK Trivedi and Dhruv Kothari appeared for the petitioner. 

Union of India was represented through advocate Satya Ranjan Swain. 

[Read Judgment]