Armed Forces Granted Emergency Financial Powers to Fight COVID

The powers will help armed forces to operate facilities, procure equipment and perform any required urgent tasks.

File photo of Defence Minister Rajnath Singh.

(Photo: PTI)

Defence Minister Rajnath Singh invoked special provisions on Friday, 30 April, to grant Emergency Financial Powers to the Armed Forces to speed up their efforts in handling the COVID-19 situation in the country.

The new powers will also help Formation Commanders to establish and operate quarantine facilities or hospitals and undertake procurement/repair of necessary equipment without the usual clearances, besides provisioning of various services and works required to support the ongoing effort against the pandemic.

Singh also tweeted about the special powers given:

Full powers have been given to the Vice Chiefs of Armed Forces and General Officer Commanding-in-Chiefs (GOC-in-Cs).

Corps Commanders and Area Commanders have been delegated powers up to Rs 50 lakh per case and Division Commanders and Sub Area Commanders and equivalents have been delegated powers up to Rs 20 lakh per case.

The powers granted have been given for a period of 3 months, from 1 May to 31 July. These are in addition to the emergency powers granted to medical officers of the armed forces.

Last week, Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) General Bipin Rawat told Prime Minister Narendra Modi that all medical personnel who had retired from the armed forces in the past couple years will be recalled and deployed at COVID facilities near them.

As per Union Health Ministry data, India recorded over 3.86 lakh new COVID-19 cases on Friday and over 3,000 deaths for the third consecutive day.