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Judgment
During the course of hearing of this petition filed under Article 226 of the Constitution, the petitioner has only prayed for interest on delayed payment of retiral dues. Admittedly, the petitioner retired on attaining the age of superannuation on 30.04.2015 (Annexure-P/1). The Pension Payment Order
(PPO) was issued on 16.10.2015.
The case of the petitioner is that the delay in making the payment is arising out of lethargy and inaction of respondents whereas the stand of the respondents is that an excess amount of Rs.1921/- was paid to the petitioner due to wrong fixation and, therefore, recovery of said amount was required to be made. After making recovery of said amount, the gratuity has been paid. This calculation consumes some time and, therefore, the question of grant of interest does not arise.
In the opinion of this Court, the respondents were custodian of records including service record. Even if there was any over payment to the petitioner, the respondents should have undertaken the said exercise of re-calculation etc. before the date of retirement of the petitioner. The date of retirement of an employee is fixed and certain. Hence the employer is required to decide and pay him retiral dues on the said date onwards. The calculation etc. should be completed before his date of retirement.
This is trite law that when delay in making the payment is solely attributable to the department, the department is bound to pay interest on the delayed payment. This view is taken by Supreme Court in 1994
(2) SCC 240 (Union of India Vs. Justice S.S.
Sandhawalia).
Accordingly, the respondents are directed to pay the interest on belated payment of retiral dues of the petitioner @12% per month. The amount of interest be calculated and paid to the petitioner within 90 days from the date of production of copy of this order.
Petition is allowed to the extent indicated hereinabove.