§ SIR SEYMOUR KING (Hull, Central)To ask the Secretary of State for India whether his attention has been drawn to the case of Major Brooke Murray, who, having been incapacitated from active service by wounds, has recently been compulsorily retired from his civil employment in the Cantonment Magistrates Department in India and deprived of his wound pension; why he has been refused 911 the furlough to which he was entitled under the rules; whether he is aware of the pecuniary loss and hardship this action has entailed on Major Murray; and whether he will reconsider the matter, with a view of seeing whether the one year's furlough to which he is entitled, and the second year's extension which might be granted on his application, may still be awarded him, and his wound pension restored.
(Answered by Mr. Secretary Brodrick.) The case of Major Brooke Murray has received very careful consideration. It is impossible to state it fully within the limits of an Answer to a Question; but I may say that Major Murray was disabled, not by wounds received in action, but by his pony slipping down while on duty, and that for his injury he received a pension annually renewable. It was granted in 1902 and renewed in 1903; whether it should be further renewed is a question which will be decided when Major Murray has appeared before the Medical Board at the India Office. No officer can claim furlough as a matter of right; but the military authorities in India were prepared to sanction Major Murray's furlough on certain conditions as to his ultimate retirement which, after careful consideration of his representations, and for reasons unconnected with his accident, they regarded as desirable. To these conditions, however, he would not agree. Nothing has come before me which would appear to justify the reconsideration of any of the various decisions which have been arrived at in his case.