BHATERI Vs. PUNJAB NATIONAL BANK

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner is the wife of late Sh. Sukhbir Singh who died while in service as Daftary in the Ashok Vihar Delhi branch of the respondent Bank. THE petitioner has been given employment as a peon in the respondent Bank on compassionate grounds. THE respondent Bank also paid the terminal dues of Sh. Sukhbir Singh to the petitioner. Sh. Sukbir Singh was not a pension optee under the first Pension Option Scheme introduced by the respondent Bank in the year 1993-94.

(2.) THE respondent Bank vide Circular dated 16 th August, 2010 introduced the second option to the employees of the respondent Bank who had not opted for pension in terms of the first option introduced in the year 1993-94. Under the said Circular, the family of those officers / employees who were in service of the respondent Bank prior to 29th September, 1995 and who had died while in service of the respondent Bank after that date but prior to 27th April, 2010 were inter alia eligible for family pension subject to:

(3.) HOWEVER, when others started receiving pension and petitioner did not, she claims to have made enquiries and was then told that she was required to deposit approximately Rs. 70,000/-but had deposited only Rs. 44,879.92 as aforesaid and thus had not become a member of the Pension Fund. Upon representations of the petitioner not meeting with any success, the present petition was filed on 1 st March, 2011 seeking directions to respondent Bank to accept the correct amount from the petitioner and to condone the delay in making the deposit of the correct amount by the stipulated date of 24th November, 2010 and to treat the petitioner as the member of the Pension Fund.