Delhi High Court
Laxmi Devi vs Commissioner Of Police And Anr. on 18 December, 2019
$~12
* IN THE HIGH COURT OF DELHI AT NEW DELHI
Date of Decision: 18.12.2019
+ W.P.(C) 542/2019
LAXMI DEVI ..... Petitioner
Through: Mr. Apurb Lal, Advocate with
Ms. Shashi, Advocate and Ms.
Meenu Pandey, Advocate.
Versus
COMMISSIONER OF POLICE & ANR. ..... Respondents
Through: Mrs. Avnish Ahlawat, Standing
Counsel for GNCTD with Mr.
Nitesh Kumar Singh, Advocate.
S.I. Jagmeshwar Dayal, Pairvi
Officer, Traffic with Constable
Nitin Tyagi, Accounts Branch,
Traffic.
CORAM:
HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE G.S. SISTANI
HON'BLE MR. JUSTICE ANUP JAIRAM BHAMBHANI
JUDGMENT
G.S.SISTANI, J. (ORAL)
1. The present petition is directed against order dated 29.11.2018
passed by the Central Administrative Tribunal ('Tribunal'). The
petitioner seeks to recover interest on the dues belonging to her
deceased son Sh. Anoop Singh, who was working as a Constable with
WPC 542/2019 page 1 of 6
the Delhi Police since 1989. Sh. Anoop Singh died on 29.01.2001
under mysterious circumstances. A case under section 279/304A IPC,
1860 was registered at PS: Mangol Puri. Admittedly, the applicant
and her husband Sh. Jagram, father of the deceased, were the
nominees in the GPF Account and Deposit Linked Insurance Scheme
(DLIS) belonging to their son. The petitioner's husband Sh. Jagram
has also since deceased. It is the case of the petitioner that she and her
deceased husband made several requests to the respondents to release
the GPF and Insurance amount owed to their late son, but to no avail.
2. The respondents however have another story to tell. According
to the respondents, there were disputes between the parents of the
deceased and his widow Mamta. The applicant/mother of the
deceased had instituted a separate suit against her daughter-in-law in
the year 2001. This suit was dismissed on 31.08.2002. An O.A.
No.2628/2002 was also filed by the mother, which was disposed of by
an order dated 09.10.2002 passed by the Tribunal, directing the
respondents to consider the mother's representation. On this
representation, the respondents passed an order dated 25.11.2002 as
per which the mother was held not eligible for the pensionary benefits
of deceased Anoop Singh. Another O.A. No.856/2003 was thereafter
filed by the applicant, which was dismissed in default on 29.04.2003.
On 17.09.2003, the applicant filed another suit against Mamta, widow
of the deceased, alleging that Mamta had no legal right to receive
pensionary benefits of deceased Anoop Singh. The matter was sent to
the PAO, GPF Cell, Delhi on 08.11.2005 for deciding whether or not
the final payment of GPF should be made to Mamta. However,
WPC 542/2019 page 2 of 6
payment of GPF and the DLIS was not made and the suit was
transferred to Tis Hazari Courts on 20.04.2006. In 2006, yet another
O.A. was filed by the applicant for grant of the deceased son's
pensionary benefits. The suit filed by the applicant was decreed in
favour of the petitioner and her late husband on 08.11.2013. As it
stands, the present position is that Mamta has since re-married and the
GPF amount is to be released in favour of the nominee/s.
3. The petitioner is aggrieved by the observations made by the
Tribunal in paras 11 to 13 of the impugned order declining payment of
interest on the pensionary dues, which we reproduce below:-
"11. I have gone through the facts of the case and considered
the arguments advanced by both sides. It is not disputed that
the husband of the applicant late Sh. Jagram was the nominee
of late Constable Anoop Singh for GPF and DLIS. It is evident
from the date-wise details provided by the respondents in their
counter-affidavit, that after the Civil Suit went in favour of the
applicant on 08.11.2013, the respondents kept asking Sh.
Jagram (late husband of the applicant) to complete the GPF
final payment forms so that the authority could be issued in his
name. When he chose not to cooperate, the respondents sent
forms to his residence. Subsequently, six letters were written to
late Sh. Jagram during the period from 05.08.2014 to
10.05.2015 to attend the office to complete the necessary
formalities. The respondents finally got the GPF form signed
by him on 14.04.2015 by sending a special messenger for this
purpose.
12. Thereafter the respondents then sent a cheque No.175983
dated 03.07.2015 for the principal amount of Rs.1,80,597/- on
account of payment of Rs.1,20,597/- (GPF) and Rs.60,000/- of
DLIS, which Sh. Jagram again refused to accept being without
interest. Due to the cussed attitude adopted by the applicant's
husband, delay in payment was inevitable. The respondents had
WPC 542/2019 page 3 of 6
ultimately to make the payment to the applicant through RTGS
in her saving account on 10.11.2017.
13. The respondents, in my view, cannot be faulted for the
delay in payment of Rs.1,20,597/- (GPF) and Rs.60,000/-
(DLIS) to the applicant since, in between they were also faced
with the Civil Suit, orders in which had to be awaited before
making the necessary payment to the applicant. Thus, I am
convinced that there is no ground of payment of interest on the
GPF & DLIS to the applicant."
4. Mr. Apurb Lal, learned counsel for the petitioner submits that
the petitioner and her deceased husband cannot be faulted for not
accepting the payments since firstly, the payments were never offered;
and secondly, they were asked to sign on blank papers and cheques
were offered without the interest component as late as in the year
2017.
5. The question which arises for our consideration is whether the
petitioner is entitled to receive interest on the dues of her late son.
6. Mrs. Avnish Ahlawat, learned Standing Counsel for the
respondents has relied upon Proviso to Rule 11(2) of General
Provident Fund (CS) Rules, 1960 which is reproduced as under:-
"Rule 11. Interest
(1) xxxxx
(2) xxxxx
Provided that when the amount standing to the credit of a
subscriber has become payable, interest shall thereupon be
credited under this rule in respect only of the period from the
beginning of the current year or from the date of deposit, as the
case may be, up to the date on which the amount standing to the
,,
credit of the subscriber became payable.
WPC 542/2019 page 4 of 6
7. Reliance is also placed on Rule 11(5), which we reproduce
below:-
"Rule 11(5) Interest shall not be credited to the account of a
subscriber if he informs the Accounts Officer that he does not
wish to receive it; but if he subsequently asks for interest, it
shall be credited with effect from the first day of the year in
,,
which he asks for it.
8. Mrs. Ahlawat submits that, as has been observed by the
Tribunal, payments could not be released on account of inter-se
disputes between the parents of the deceased and his widow i.e. their
daughter-in-law, which is evident from various inter-se litigations,
which were pending and orders passed from time-to-time. She further
submits that even otherwise, the nominee in the GPF Account and
DLIS being the husband (since deceased) and the petitioner, had
refused to accept the amount which is evident from the fact that as
many as six letters were written to Sh. Jagram from 05.08.2014 to
10.04.2015 to visit the Accounts Office to complete the necessary
formalities. The bona fides of the respondents are established by the
fact that the respondents finally got the GPF form signed by late Sh.
Jagram on 14.04.2015 by sending a special messenger to his house for
this purpose. Mrs. Ahlawat also contends that a cheque in the sum of
Rs.1,20,597/- towards GPF amount and Rs.60,000/- towars DLIS
amount was tendered to Sh. Jagram, which he refused to accept since,
he said, the same did not contain the interest component. The bona
fides of the respondents are further established from the fact that
ultimately the amount was remitted to the petitioner through RTGS in
her savings account on 07.11.2017.
WPC 542/2019 page 5 of 6
9. In our view, the Tribunal has rightly held that no interest would
be payable to the petitioner. The relevant Rules relied upon by Mrs.
Ahlawat would squarely apply to the facts of the present case.
Besides, there is no denying the fact that the petitioner and her late
husband were in litigation with their daughter-in-law over the dues of
their late son; and that the petitioner's late husband had refused to
receive the dues since these were tendered without any interest.
Resultanly, we do not find any ground to interefere by way of this
petition. The same is accordingly dismissed.
G.S.SISTANI, J.
ANUP JAIRAM BHAMBHANI, J.
DECEMBER 18, 2019
Ne
WPC 542/2019 page 6 of 6
