ANIL BHANDARI Vs. UNITED INDIA INSURANCE CO

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE petitioner was the employee of the respondent United Insurance Company. On the completion of qualifying service he gave notice of 90 days seeking voluntary retirement from service w. e. f. 19/11/1997. His request of voluntary retirement was accepted and he retired on 19/11/1997.

(2.) THE petitioner's case is that he had submitted his papers from terminal benefits immediately after he gave notice seeking voluntary retirement, but he has not been given benefits as yet. It has been averred that the respondents are not correctly counting his length of service for calculating the pension and he has been deprived of his right of commutation of pension as well. It has been further averred that on the petitioner's making repeated requests to the respondents to give retiral benefits to him a cheque for Rs. 1,12,304/- as against gratuity amount was given to the petitioner but at the same time he was asked to make endorsement on the cheque in favour of the respondent-company as some amount was outstanding against him. It has been stated that income tax has been wrongly deducted from the amount payable to him on account of the gratuity and that the amount payable for the leave encashment has also not been correctly calculated as 22 days leave earned by him in 1997 have not been added to his account. It was further been stated that the amount of pension and gratuity could not be retained on account of dues against the petitioner. It has been prayed that the respondents be directed (i) to reckon his 25 1/2 years service for the purposes of pension instead of 25 years; (ii) to refund Rs. 2200/- recovered from the petitioner under the head Incometax and (iii) to release his pension and gratuity without adjusting the amount of loan due against him.

(3.) THE important question that needs determination is whether the respon- dents are entitled to adjust the amount of the house building loans from the amount of pension and gratuity payable to the petitioner. Both the learned counsel have relied on the provisions of General Insurance (Employees) Pension Scheme, 1995 formulated by the Central Government in exercise of the power conferred under Sec. 17a of the General Insurance Business (Nationalisation) Act, 1972. Para 48 of the Scheme reads as follows : ``48 Recovery of dues of the Corporation or a Company:- THE Corporation or a Company shall be entitled to recover the dues to the Corporation or a Company on account of housing loans, advances, license fee, other recoveries and recoveries due to employees' co-op- erative credit Societies from the commutation value of the pension or the pension or the family pension. '' It is obvious that the Pension Scheme itself provides that the amount outstanding against an employee on account of housing loans can be recovered from the pensionary benefits. It is relevant to point out that the petitioner has not challenged the provisions of Para 48 of the Pension Scheme. That being so, there is no legal impediments in the recovery of the outstanding amount on account of housing loans from the pensionary benefits.