IN THE HIGH COURT OF PUNJAB AND HARYANA AT CHANDIGARH Civil Writ Petition No.19931 of 2008 Date of decision:18.03.2010 Hans Raj Goyal ....Petitioner versus Haryana Dairy Development Cooperative Federation Limited. ...Respondent CORAM: HON’BLE MR. JUSTICE K. KANNAN ---- Present: Mr. K.K.Gupta, Advocate, for the petitioner. Mr. Hari Pal Verma, Advocate, for the respondent. ---- 1. Whether reporters of local papers may be allowed to see the judgment ? 2. To be referred to the reporters or not ? 3. Whether the judgment should be reported in the digest ? ---- K.Kannan, J. (Oral) 1. The petitioner seeks by means of a writ of mandamus a direction to the respondent to release the payment of leave encashment accrued in his favour, consequent on his retirement on 29.02.2000. Admittedly on the date of his retirement, only gratuity had been released and the amount due under leave encashment was not released, purportedly on the ground that he was proceeded against departmentally when he was in service and a final decision had not been taken by the authority pursuant to the enquiry constituted against him. It is an admitted case again that during the pendency of proceedings, an amount of Rs.1,43,880/- was paid to the petitioner, representing the principal amount of the leave encashment. Civil Writ Petition No.19931 of 2008 - 2 - 2. The learned counsel appearing for the petitioner states that the departmental proceedings which had been initiated against the petitioner exonerated the petitioner from the charges against him by the report of the Enquiry Officer as early as on 23.08.1999 and the disciplinary authority had not chosen to take any different decision either dissenting with the report of the Enquiry Officer or confirming the same. In any event, according to the learned counsel, when the Enquiry Officer's report had not been expressly dissented, it should be taken that there were no pending charges on the date when he was superannuated. The learned counsel also refers to the fact that he had applied under the RTI Act with the Manager (Administration) of the respondent-federation about the result of enquiry against him to which the Public Information Officer has responded by stating that the competent authority after receiving the enquiry report had not passed any dissenting note/order, that since then more than 10 years have passed and under such circumstances, the disciplinary proceedings ought to be deemed to be closed. 3. The learned counsel also refers to the office memorandum by the office of Haryana office Finance Department, dated 20.02.2002 detailing the procedure for payment of interest on delayed retiral benefits. Clause 4 in the memorandum read with clause 6 obtain relevance in this case and hence they are reproduced:- “4. In cases where the delay exceeds a period of three months in settlement and payment of such retiral benefits, the same should be paid along with interest calculated from the date of retirement till the date of payment. Wherever the Civil Writ Petition No.19931 of 2008 - 3 - delay in settlement and payment of retiral benefits is beyond a period of six months from the date of retirement, the interest should be paid to the retired employee/pensioner but the interest amount beyond a period of six months should be recovered from the employee(s) responsible for causing such delay. 5. ................ 6. The issue pertaining to the admissible rate of interest in these cases has also been considered. It has been observed that the interest rate regime remains volatile and it keeps on changing from time to time in view of the economic and monetary policies in force at various points in time. In the face of changing scenario in this respect, it has been decided, in supersession of al instructions issued on the subject here-to-before, that the rate of interest admissible in all these cases should be linked with the interest rate in force on General Provident Fund Accounts of the Government employees from time to time. Even today as on the date of issue of these instructions, the admissible interest rate on GPF accumulations is 9.5% which is higher than the rate of interest being offered by all banks on term deposits. Accordingly, the rate of interest should be applied at the rate in force on GPF of Government employees relevant to the period for which such interest becomes payable.” 4. The delay beyond a period of 6 months makes the State liable for interest at 9.5% per annum and the memorandum also makes possible the scope for recovery against an officer for such delayed disbursal. In this case, the respondent-federation could not have withheld the leave encashment when the Enquiry Officer's report had not been dissented during all the time when he was in service. The delay in Civil Writ Petition No.19931 of 2008 - 4 - disbursal therefore shall be visited with a liability on the Government to pay interest in the manner provided under the memorandum. 5. The petitioner is entitled to interest at 9.5% on Rs.1,43,880/- from 29.02.2000 till the date of payment. The respondent-federation will be at liberty to proceed against any officer, who had been responsible for causing the delay in disbursal in the manner contemplated in the memorandum. 6. The writ petition is allowed on the above terms with cost assessed at Rs.5,000/- in favour of the petitioner. (K.KANNAN) JUDGE 18.03.2010 sanjeev