Double Family Pension

Queries are constantly received on this blog as to whether families of re-employed defence pensioners are entitled to the benefit of double family pension separately for military service and re-employed service. For example, if a military pensioner joins a pensionable non-military service after his release from the defence services and then dies in harness while in the subsequent service or dies after earning the second pension, then is his family entitled to the benefit of double family pension separately in respect of both the services ?.
The answer is NO.
However there are exceptions to the rule. In case the second pension is ‘contributory’ in nature, then both family pensions are admissible. The Courts have held that both family pensions would also be admissible if the second pension is granted from a non-government fund or from a fund / trust specifically created for the purposes of a pension scheme as is the case with most nationalised banks.
While the above is the current legal position, it would actually be much desirable if families of those personnel, civil or military, who have earned two pensions, are also granted the benefit of two family pensions since if the government employee himself / herself had earned two pensions, then depriving the family of the extension of the same does not stand to logic.