CWP (T) No. 2325 of 2008 4.12.2008 Present: Mr. Neel Kamal Sood, Advocate for the petitioner. Mr. R.K. Sharma, Sr. Addl. A.G. with Mr. Rajinder Dogra, Addl. A.G. and Mr. Vikas Rathore, Dy.A.G. for the respondents. Mr. Neel Kamal Sood has confined his prayer, during the course of hearing, only to the denial of retiral benefits to his client. His precise submission is that the period he was engaged on daily wages basis was required to be taken into consideration while calculating the qualifying service. He has strongly relied upon judgment rendered by a Division Bench of this Court in State of H.P. & ors. Vs. Sarab Dayal, 2007 Current Law Journal (HP) (Suppl.) 505. The Division Bench of this Court has held as under: “The next contention on behalf of the employees is that in terms of Decision No.2 taken by the Government of India and quoted hereinabove, half of the service rendered on daily wages should be counted. Admittedly all the employees were employed in jobs involving full and whole time employment. It is also a fact that though they were paid on daily wages, they were doing a type of work or were working against such posts which could have been sanctioned, but for reasons best known to the State the posts were not actually sanctioned. The decision also envisages that the service should be one for which payment is made on monthly or daily rates computed and paid on monthly basis. In all the case before us, the employees though engaged on daily rated basis were paid on monthly basis. The employees who were paid on daily wage basis continued in service for long periods of 10 years or more whereafter they were brought on work charge establishment and their services were regularized. The stand of the State is that the employees were not persons paid from contingencies. According to the State, the employees were paid out of the sanctioned plan expenditure of the works where they were employed. It is submitted that the employees have not been paid out of the contingency fund. This contention is without any force. The word “contingencies” as used in the Rules does not relate to the contingent fund of the State. In our considered view the words contingencies in the present case must be given its natural grammatical meaning. The Concise Oxford Dictionary defines contingencies as a future event or circumstance which is possible but cannot be predicted with certainty. It also defines contingencies to mean a provision made for meeting for such event or circumstance. Black’s Law Dictionary defines contingencies as something that may or may not happen an event which may occur possibility etc. It is clear that contingencies in respect of Pension Rules only means that the workers are not paid from out of the regular salary account of the State, but are paid from other funds which are created to meet such possible contingencies. Therefore, the benefit of decision No.2 under Rule 14 is available both to persons who were in casual and daily rated employment as well as persons paid from contingencies as long as the conditions mentioned in decision No. 2 are met. It would also be pertinent to add that we see no reason for differentiating between daily rated workmen who have been allowed to continue for 10 years or more and employees paid from contingencies. There is no rational nexus in this classification. The classification, if accepted, would be totally arbitrary, invidious and violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India. In our considered opinion the daily rated workmen who are permitted to continue for 10 long years followed by regularization cannot be denied the benefit of pension on this count. …… We are, therefore, of the considered view that 50% of the continues service rendered by the employees on daily rated basis followed by work charge/regular employment should be taken into account while calculating the qualifying service for purpose of entitlement to and the amount of pension to be paid to them.” In view of the definitive law laid down by the Division Bench of this Court, the respondents are directed to work out the retiral benefits of the petitioner after counting 50% of the continuous service rendered by him on daily rated basis followed by work charge/regular employee within a period of four weeks from today. The retiral benefits will be payable to the petitioner with interest at the rate of 8% per annum. In view of these observations, the writ petition is disposed of. No costs. (Rajiv Sharma), J. December 4, 2008. (cr)