Dismissed

Nagar Nigam Bareilly and Another v. Guru Prasad Saxena

Allahabad HC1 May 2019SPLA/508/2019

Case brief

AI extract

What is this about?

The court dismissed a special appeal challenging an order directing the Nagar Nigam to pay 8% annual interest on the respondent's provident fund. The appellants argued funds were deposited in a saving account with lower interest; the court found no evidence supporting this claim and upheld the 8% rate.

What did the court decide?

No interference with the single judge's order directing payment of interest at 8% per annum on the provident fund amount.

Nagar Nigam Bareilly and Another Vs Guru… — Pension and Retirement Benefits | Allahabad HC (2019)

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Court No. - 21

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Case :- SPECIAL APPEAL No. - 508 of 2019

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Appellant :- Nagar Nigam Bareilly And Another Respondent :- Guru Prasad Saxena Counsel for Appellant :- Hemant Kumar Counsel for Respondent :- Samir Sharma

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Hon'ble Pradeep Kumar Singh Baghel,J. Hon'ble Rohit Ranjan Agarwal,J.

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This special appeal arises from an order of the learned Single Judge dated 17.1.2019 whereby the respondent-petitioner's writ petition being Writ-A No. 47147 of 2004 (Guru Prasad Saxena v. Nagar Nigam, Bareilly and another) has been allowed and a direction has been issued to the appellants - Nagar Nigam to pay the interest at the rate of 8% per annum on provident fund amount.

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Learned counsel for the appellants submits that the direction of the learned Singe Judge to pay interest at the rate of 8% is illegal and not justified for the reason that Government Order dated 5.11.1995 provides that amount deducted against the provident fund of an employees be deposited under the Saving Bank Account. Another similar Government Order has been issued subsequently on 26.10.2017. Both the Government Orders are on the record. No other submission has been made.

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Briefly stated the facts are these: the petitioner was an employee of Nagar Nigam, Bareilly. He was initially appointed on 19.1.1968 and he reached his age of superannuation on 31.1.2000 at the age of 60 years. The grievance of the petitioner was that he retired in the year 2000 but his post retiral dues were not paid hence he made several representations in that regard. On 28.9.2001 he was paid gratuity, however, no interest on delayed payment was paid. It is stated that the petitioner was paid a sum of Rs. 68,328.77 and as interest against the provident fund amount was paid Rs. 308/- for the year 1986-87.

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A counter affidavit was filed in the writ petition wherein the stand

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taken in the counter by the respondents is that the petitioner has been paid the provident fund, gratuity etc. with interest on 6.10.2001. An affidavit was also filed by the Accounts Officer, Nagar Nigam, Bareilly in compliance of the order of this Court dated 9.1.2008. In paragraph-4 of the said affidavit it has been averred that the petitioner has been paid the interest which is payable in saving bank account. For the sake of convenience paragraph-4 of the aforesaid affidavit is extracted below:

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“4. That so far the Provident Fund is concerned, the same has been paid to the petitioner with the interest which, are given by the Bank in the Saving Bank Accounts. It is submitted that Provident Fund of all the employees are kept in one Saving Bank Account maintained by the Nigam with the Panjab National Bank. The interest accrued on the total sum is distributed proportionally among the employees taking into the consideration the amount of Provident Fund.”

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Learned counsel for the appellant has drawn our attention to the Government Orders dated 5.11.2005 and 26.10.2017. We have perused the said Government Orders. We do not find any direction of the State Government in the said Government Orders to deposit the contribution deducted from the employees in the Saving Bank Account. Hence the entire stand taken by the appellants has no justifiable basis. Relevant part of the Government Order dated 5.11.1995 reads as under:

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---,slh fLFkfr esa jkT; ljdkj }kjk ;g fu.kZ; fy;k x;k gS fd Hkfo"; fuokZg fuf/k ds fufeRr osru ls dkVh x;h izR;sd /kujkf'k lEcfU/kr vf/kdkjh@ deZpkjh ds lqlaxr ys[ks esa vfoyEc tek djk nh tk;s vkSj ;fn vko';d gks rks mlds lEcU/k esa ;Fkk fLFkfr mRrj izns'k vf/kfu;e dh /kkjk 35 ;k m0iz0 uxj fuxe vf/kfu;e dh /kkjk 533 vkSj 534 fo"k;d dk;Zokgh lqfuf'pr dh tk;s A

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A perusal of the aforementioned Government Order clearly indicates that the direction of the State Government is to deposit contribution from the salary of an employee in lqlaxr ys[kk. We find that lqlaxr ys[kk is not the saving account (cpr [kkrk). It is a common knowledge that the rate of interest of the Saving Bank Account

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is around 4% only, whereas the interest in the G.P.F. or Public Provident Fund is about 8%. Thus, the submission as well as the stand of the appellant that the contribution of the petitioner-respondent was deposited in the Saving Bank Account is not justifiable. Accordingly, we find that the view taken by the learned Single Judge that the petitioner-respondent is entitled for the interest at the rate of 8% per annum does not warrant any interference. No material has been brought in our notice by learned counsel for the appellant to indicate that the contribution of an employee should be deposited in Saving Bank Account, where the rate of interest is 4%. In absence of any material to the aforesaid fact, we do not find any ground to interfere in the order of the learned Single Judge.

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Accordingly, the special appeal lacks merit. It is accordingly dismissed.

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There shall be no order as to costs.

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Order Date :- 1.5.2019 Digamber

Nagar Nigam Bareilly and Another v. Guru Prasad Saxena

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Nagar Nigam Bareilly and Another v. Guru Prasad Saxena

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