Army widow runs from pillar to post to claim her dues

When Major Ashok Sangali from the 17 Maratha Light Infantry volunteered for Operation Rakshak, an anti-insurgency operation in Kashmir, his wife backed the decision with pride.

She was in Bangalore when she got a telephone call informing her that her husband lost his life to militant bullets. Two days later, Major Sangali’s embalmed body reached home, and was cremated with full military honours.

That was in November, 2001. Now, after close to a decade, Mrs Sangali is still waiting for the dues entitled to her as a war widow from the state government. While she has received the dues from the army, the state government is yet to grant her a piece of land, where she had dreamt of setting up an old age home. Now that just remains a dream.

Mrs Sangali routed her request through the Directorate of Sainik Welfare and Resettlement. She had identified three acres at Sathnoor, and the request was forwarded to the deputy commissioner and then to the tahsildar.

She started the application process in 2003. At the tahsildar’s office, a file was opened, which was sent to the revenue department after many back and forth trips.

“They shot down the request. I never gave up. So, I identified another piece of land in Hesarghatta and another file was opened,” Mrs Sangali recalled.

This time, the land was cleared by the tahsildar’s office and the file reached the revenue department. Then revenue minister Jagadish Shettar seemed ready to help but just a day before the file reached his office, the government fell and, with it, the file.

She met the advisor to the then governor Rameshwar Thakur and gave him a representation, yet nothing came of it.  “Again, I didn’t give up, started another application procedure—this time, a piece of land at Chikkaballapur. To follow up, I met MP HN Ananth Kumar, MP Rajeev Chandrashekar, and several others in power. Everybody promised to help, yet nothing has materialised,” she said.

“It’s never the problem with the authorities, but the system that is inefficient,” she said. “Files are lost in transit, hit road-blocks and attempts to get them cleared are humiliating,” she added.

Now, Mrs Sangali has given up. Her file is gathering dust at the tahsildar’s office in Chikkaballapur. She refuses to do any more ‘follow-ups’. Understandable, since she has run pillar to post enough in the last eight years. 

“I’ve been beaten by the system,” she said with despair.