Sudipta Basu vs The State Of West Bengal & Ors
2022 Latest Caselaw 5268 Cal

10.08.2022
  Sl. No.633
    ap

                                  W.P.A. 12233 of 2022

                                         Sudipta Basu
                                              -Vs-
                                The State of West Bengal & Ors.

                      Mrs. Mithu Singha Mahapatra,
                      Mrs. Ina Bhattacharya
                                          ... ... for the petitioner


                      Affidavit of service filed in court today is kept with
               the record.

                      The petitioner was an 'Assistant Teacher', who
               retired on 30.06.2021. He had completed all his pension
               related formalities prior to his retirement. However, the
               concerned authorities delayed and released his gratuity
               and arrear pension amount on 07.03.2022 in terms of
               ROPA, 2019. The petitioner herein seeks interest to be
               paid on the gratuity and arrear pension for the interim
               period of delay in receipt of the gratuity and arrear pension
               amount in terms of ROPA, 2019.


                      There is a considerable delay in filing of the writ
               petition, which the petitioner seeks to justify by stating that
               there is no statutory period of limitation and neither parties
               have suffered due to this delay. It is the submission of the
               petitioner that accordingly the petition should be allowed.

                      The petitioner relies upon an order in W.P. 17557
               (W) of 2017 (Narayan Chandra Saha vs. State of West
               Bengal & Ors.) wherein a co-ordinate Bench had relied
               upon the Supreme Court judgment in the case of Union of
               India vs. Tarsem Singh, reported in (2008) 8 SCC 648 on
               the issue of limitation relating to payment or refixation of
               pay or pension wherein the Apex Court had held that relief
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may be granted in spite of delay as it does not affect the
rights of the third party.

       In view of the above and after hearing the learned
Counsel for the parties, I direct the Director of Pension,
Provident Fund and Group Insurance, Government of
West Bengal as also the concerned Treasury Officer to
pay interest to the petitioner @ 8% per annum on the
revised gratuity calculated on and from 01.07.2021 till the
date of actual payment.      Such payment is to be made
within a period of eight weeks from the date of
communication of this order.


       With these observations, the writ petition is
disposed of.

       Since, no affidavit-in-opposition has been called for,
the allegations made in the writ petition are deemed to
have not been admitted by the respondents.

There will be no order as to costs.

Urgent photostat certified copy of this order, if applied for, be given to the parties, on priority basis.

(Rajasekhar Mantha, J.)