Sujatha N vs Southern Railway & Ors

K Haripal, Member J

The applicant is the legally appointed guardian of an invalid person who was nominated as 2nd beneficiary in respect of the employee Shri S. Padmanabhan who retired from service of the respondents on 03.04.1978. He had nominated his wife as the 1st beneficiary and the invalid son as 2nd beneficiary; the said nomination was accepted by the respondents by Annexure A6 communication whereby it is stated that his 'son P. Sunilkumar is accepted as second beneficiary for the family pension'. Going by the communication, Sunilkumar will become eligible for the family pension, 'when such a contingency arises i.e., after the life time of the pensioner and family pensioner (first beneficiary)'. The family pensioner, wife of the employee is the 1st beneficiary. The pensioner died on 20.01.2008 and the family pensioner, the first beneficiary the wife of the pensioner died on 09.08.2019. The applicant has obtained Annexure A4 legal guardianship certificate from the District Collector, Kollam, the competent authority under Section 14 of National Trust Act 1999. The grievance of the applicant is that in spite of repeated representations given to the respondents, pension is not being sanctioned to the 2nd beneficiary, who has been found invalid. The applicant therefore filed this O.A for a direction to the respondent Nos. 2 and 3 to sanction and disburse family pension on the basis of Annexure A6 and also to direct the respondent Nos. 2 & 3 to pay and disburse arrears of family pension with effect from 10.08.2019 following the date of death of the 1st beneficiary.

Today when taken up, learned standing counsel for the respondents submits that they are ready to sanction the pension to 2nd beneficiary fixing disability of the brother of the applicant at 50%.

Learned counsel for the applicant who represented submits that the applicant has no objection in disposing of the application fixing a time limit for the disbursal of the payments.

After hearing counsel on both sides, the O.A is disposed of directing the respondents to disburse pension to the 2nd beneficiary Sri P. Sunilkumar with entire arrears, within a period of 45 days from the date of receipt of a copy of this order. Communicate the order forthwith. No costs.