Description

About the book

The book examines comparatively the policies for the welfare of the war widows before and after the independence. Before independence, there were almost no welfare schemes for the war-widows and they were facing many hardships. The British never seriously thought about Indian soldiers who were martyred in the wars fought by the British for their imperial causes. However, after independence, Indian Government established various funds for the welfare of war-widows and dependents. Due to less expenditure on the army during the earlier period, the financial assistance was not enough for war-widows. In the 1970s the Government started a policy of ex-gratia and some other notable welfare schemes for the war-widows. These schemes helped a lot to them. After the Kargil war, the expenditure on defence was greatly increased which provided great support to the war-widows and their dependents. Now the Government established new funds and granted concessions for war-widows. These funds helped to war-widows by providing better education to their children. The Government also provided different types of grants to them such as marriage grants, medical grants etc. The Government also offered different types of facilities for war-widows e.g. reservations in education institutes, housing societies, government services and other concessions. These facilities were granted by Central Government as well as State Governments on a massive scale.

About the author

Mamta Hatwal is a research scholar at Panjab University, Chandigarh having around 4 years of research experience in various national and International Universities. She is M.A. (History) B.Ed., M.Phil. and is currently pursuing her PhD in History with UGC-JRF fellowship. She stayed in several countries and studied culture and language. She worked as a research fellow at the University of South Bohemia, Czech Republic. Being from a Family with an Army Background she was and opted to work on the issue of War Widows. During her research, she focused on the welfare and policy-related issues of War Widows. She has published a number of research papers in journals of international repute.