PRAMOD KUMAR SINGH Vs. STATE OF U.P.

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Heard learned counsel for the petitioner, Sri Udai Bhanu Singh, learned counsel for the Respondents No. 5 and 7 and Sri Satyam Singh, learned counsel for the Respondent No.3.

(2.) This Court has heard the parties at length and finds that the petitioner's claim gratuity from their initial date of engagement as Ad hoc employees on the basis of an order passed on 8/10/1985 after agreement between the parties that they shall be regularized w.e.f. the initial date of their engagement. In the said order of regularization, an exception was carved out only to the extent that back wages and other allowances and other kind of arrears shall not be claimed by such regularized employees. No mention was made therein that gratuity will not be payable to them as gratuity is not an arrear and it becomes payable only when a person retires.

(3.) It has been argued by the learned counsel for the petitioners that initially when they had approached the respondents, the matter was referred to the Cooperative Institutional Service Board, and the Cooperative Institutional Service Board while considering the definition of employee as given under the Act had rejected the claim of the petitioners for gratuity w.e.f. their initial date of engagement. The petitioners challenged such order dtd. 4/9/2019 in Writ A No. 18804 of 2019, 'Pramod Kumar Singh and 2 Others vs. State of U.P. and Others. This Court by its order dtd. 28/11/2019 observed that the Secretary of the Institutional Service Board is not the Competent Authority/Controlling Authority under the Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972. The petitioner should make their claim before the Controlling Authority under the Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972 and the order passed by the Secretary of the Cooperative Institutional Service Board would not come in the way of the Controlling Authority to pass appropriate orders. The Bank challenged such order in Special Appeal Defective No. 284 of 2020 which was allowed on 13/10/2020 by referring to the observations made by the Hon'ble Supreme Court in the Case of Ghaziabad Zila Sahkari Bank Ltd. Vs. Addl. Labour Commissioner and Others (2007) 11 SCC 756 followed in Shobhai Ram Vs. State of U.P. 2014 (6) ADJ 280. The Appellate Court observed that the 1975 Regulations specifically have a provision for Gratuity under Regulation 95, and therefore, such provision shall govern the employees of Cooperative Societies and not the Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972.