Court No. - 36
Case :- WRIT - A No. - 9945 of 2021 Petitioner :- Arun Kumar Jha Respondent :- State Of U.P. And 4 Others Counsel for Petitioner :- Azad Khan Counsel for Respondent :- C.S.C.,Pranjal Mehrotra
Hon'ble Mahesh Chandra Tripathi,J.
Heard learned counsel for the petitioner, learned Standing Counsel for the State respondent no.1 and Shri Sunil Kumar Dubey, learned counsel for respondent nos.2 to 5.
The petitioner is before this Court with request to issue direction to the fourth respondent to release his entire post retiral dues including gratuity, leave encashment, arrears of pension, group insurance and dearness allowance, alongwith 9% interest.
The petitioner was a Pump Operator Grade-II in the respondent department. The grievance of the petitioner is that he retired in April, 2021 but his entire post retiral benefits have not been paid to him.
It is a trite law that the post retiral benefits of an employee should be paid without any delay and if there is any laxity in the payment of post retiral benefits of any employee, he/she shall be entitled for the interest on the delayed payment. Reference may be made to the judgements of the Supreme Court in State of Kerala and others v. M. Padmanabhan Nair, AIR 1985 SC 356, and Vijay L. Mehrotra v. State of U.P. and others, (2001) 9 SCC 687.
Taking into consideration the facts and circumstances of the case, in my view the end of justice would be met by issuing a direction upon the fourth respondent/Executive Engineer, 3rd Construction Division, U.P. Jal Nigam, Ghazipur to consider the cause of the petitioner and pass appropriate order expeditiously. In case there is any legal impediment in payment of the post retiral benefits the concerned officer shall pass a speaking and reasoned order expeditiously preferably within three weeks from the date of communication of this order, if it has not been decided earlier, failing which the petitioner would be entitled to interest @ 6% on the delayed payment.
The writ petition is, accordingly, disposed of. There shall be no order as to costs.
The party shall file computer generated copy of such order downloaded from the official website of High Court Allahabad, self attested by the petitioner alongwith a self attested identity proof of the said person (preferably Aadhar Card) mentioning the mobile number to which the said Aadhar Card is linked.
The concerned Authority/Official shall verify the authenticity of such computerised copy of the order from the official website of High Court Allahabad and shall make a declaration of such verification in writing.
Order Date :- 12.8.2021 RKP