IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.17114 of 2008 Date of decision: 17.02.2010 Zorawar Singh Sahu ….Petitioner versus Haryana Dairy Development Cooperative Federation Limited and another. …Respondents CORAM: HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE K. KANNAN ----- Present: Mr. K.K.Gupta, Advocate, for the petitioner. Mr. Hari Pal Verma, Advocate, for respondent No.1. ---- 1. Whether Reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment ? Yes. 2. To be referred to the reporters or not ? Yes. 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the digest ? Yes. ---- K.Kannan, J. (Oral) 1. The petitioner claims that although he was retired from service on 31.01.2005, the gratuity was paid to him only on 17.02.2006 and the amount by way of leave encashment was paid only in January, 2010. The petitioner relies on the proceedings of the Government of Haryana, Finance Department, dated 20.02.2002 where the liability of payment of interest on delayed retiral benefits was considered and it set itself a time limit of 3 months for settlement and payment of such retiral benefits. For any delay beyond a period of 3 months, the memorandum directs that it shall be paid with interest calculated from the date of retirement till the date of payment. Whenever the delay in settlement and Civil Writ Petition No.17114 of 2008 - 2 - payment of all retiral benefits is beyond a period of 6 months from the date of retirement, the interest should be paid to the retired employee/pensioner but the interest amount paid beyond a period of 6 months would also be recovered from the employee responsible for causing such delay. 2. It is an obvious case where the gratuity and the amount due on leave encashment had been paid beyond a period of 6 months from the date of the retirement. If there is a delay in disbursement, the delay shall be explained not by the petitioner but only by the respondent. The contention in defence by the respondent is that the petitioner was facing a criminal case and therefore, the amount was not paid till its conclusion. It is the further contention that the petitioner had filed a civil suit and the suit was also dismissed. The amount could not be paid due to the pendency of the civil suit. 3. The pendency of a criminal case itself is not cited to be a justification for delay in the office memorandum. The exceptions however, are constitution of a disciplinary proceeding and the OM contemplates three different situations: (i) when the disciplinary proceedings are pending at the time of retirement and when an employee is clearly exonerated; (ii) when the disciplinary proceedings are pending and when the employee is held guilty partially or fully; and (iii) in the case, where disciplinary proceedings are dropped on account of lack of evidence. In the first situation, interest shall be paid with interest from the date of retirement till date of payment. In the second situation, no interest will be paid till the period of 3 months from the date of final Civil Writ Petition No.17114 of 2008 - 3 - decision of the disciplinary proceedings and in the third situation, no interest would again be paid till the period of 3 months from the date of the final decision of the disciplinary proceedings. The petitioner’s case is not attracted to any of these situations. However, the learned counsel appearing for the petitioner states that there had been a criminal case instituted against him under the Prevention of Corruption Act before the Sub Judge, Rohtak. I find from the copy of the judgment produced before me that the Sessions Case No.14 of 2005 has been instituted on 04.01.2005 and the case has been decided on 24.09.2009. The pendency of a criminal case does not itself disentitle the petitioner to obtain the retiral benefits in the light of the OM referred to above. The contention on behalf of the respondent that on account of the pendency of a civil suit, the amount could not be paid, does not also answer the issue for if the petitioner had pursued the remedy in another forum and it should have at least sensitized the respondents to make up the payment of what was justly due to the petitioner. The suit appears to have been dismissed for want of jurisdiction and I do not see how the dismissal could forfeit the entitlement of the petitioner to claim for interest in the manner provided by the OM. 4. The respondent shall be liable to pay the amount of gratuity paid at 9.5% interest from 31.01.2005 to 02.05.2006 and as regards the leave encashment, the amount that has been paid shall bear similar interest at 9.5% per annum from 31.01.2005 to 10.01.2010. The amounts shall be calculated and paid over to the petitioner within a period of 4 weeks from the date of the receipt of the copy of this order. Civil Writ Petition No.17114 of 2008 - 4 - 5. The writ petition is allowed on the above terms with costs assessed at Rs.5,000/-. (K.KANNAN) JUDGE 17.02.2010 sanjeev