Madras HC: 36-year delay in granting pension to widow inhuman
CHENNAI: Fuming over the delay of more than three-and-half decades in disbursing terminal benefits to the family of a lowest-rung government employee who died in harness, the Madras High Court has called the government officials concerned ‘inhuman’ and ordered the disbursement within eight weeks.
The matter pertains to an intra-court appeal filed by the district collectors of Chennai and Kancheepuram and Saidapet Tahsildar against a single judge’s order for disbursing the terminal benefits and family pension to the widow of TS Perumal, a village assistant employed with the revenue department in Saidapet Taluk who died in 1987.
His wife Jaya approached the officials concerned for the death-cum retirement benefits to be given to the family. The sub-collector and the district collector directed the Tahsildar to forward the proposals for processing disbursement. However, it was not carried out.
The widow approached the high court with a petition in 2004 and the court passed orders in 2017, directing the officials to disburse the benefits to the family. Challenging the order, the officials preferred appeal in 2019. In the meantime, the woman passed away without getting a single paisa from the government. Subsequently, her son Natheesbabu was made second respondent in the case.
A division bench of the High Court consisting of Justices R Suresh Kumar and C Kumarappan recently ordered the officials to pay the benefits within eight weeks. Decrying the denial of the benefits to the poor family, the bench said, “This kind of attitude, instead of being termed as unlawful, arbitrary, this court- in one word- can explain it as inhuman.”
Pointing out the long delay of 36 years, the court said the case can be taken as a ‘model case’ by the government and formulate a new mechanism. It suggested the government to amend the government employees service law so as to ensure the benefits reach the families of deceased employees within a maximum period of six months. “To achieve this goal, we believe and expect the state government comes forward with a permanent solution by having a scheme to streamline the system,” the court said.