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IN THE HIGH COURT OF GAUHATI, NAGALAND, MIZORAM AND ARUNACHAL PRADESH
Manish Choudhury, J.
Bhabendra Kumar Baishya, S/O- Late Jiban Chandra Baishya – Petitioner
Versus
The State Of Assam, Represented By The Principal Secretary To The Government Of Assam, Panchayat And Rural Development Department And Ors. – Respondents
WP(C)/4836/2024
Decided On : 08-01-2025
JUDGMENT :
Manish Choudhury, J.
Heard Mr. M. Islam, learned counsel for the petitioner; Mr. S. Dutta, learned Standing Counsel, Panchayat & Rural Development [P&RD] Department for the respondent nos. 1, 4 & 6; Ms. M. Bhattacharjee, learned Additional Senior Government Advocate, Assam for the respondent nos. 2 & 5; and Mr. B. Gogoi, learned Standing Counsel, Finance Department for the respondent nos. 3 & 7.
2. The necessary facts which are not in dispute and which are also reflected in the Pension Payment Order [PPO] of the petitioner being PPO no. ADP/PRI/PPO /GPO/2012/000668 [at page 77 of the case papers] can be stated as follows :-
3. During the service tenure of the petitioner, the State Government had enacted the Assam Panchayat Employees [Provincialisation] Act, 1999 [‘the Act’, for short] and as per the provisions of the Act, the provincialised Panchayat Secretaries are to be provided pension and other retirement dues in terms of the provisions of the Act. The services of the petitioner came to be provincialised accordingly, in terms of the provisions of the Act.
4. When a dispute arose as regards the date from which the period of services of the provincialised Panchayat Secretaries was to be counted for the purpose of pension and other retirement dues under the provisions of the Act, litigations ensued. A Division Bench of this Court in a writ appeal, Writ Appeal no. 145/2009 [The State of Assam & another vs. Syed Md. Fazlay Rabbi] and a batch of writ petitions in its common Judgment and Order dated 24.03.2010 set the issue at rest by holding that the benefits of the provisions of the Assam Panchayat Employees [Provincialisation] Act, 1999 [the Act] including those for pension and other retirement dues, would be available to the provincialised employees in service on or after 01.10.1991 on the basis of the length of their services reckoned from the dates of their initial appointments. Special leave petitions, Special Leave to Appeal [Civil] Nos. 19351– 19360/2010 preferred against the common Judgment and Order dated 24.03.2010 was dismissed by the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India on 02.08.2010. Thereafter, the State Government in the Pension and Public Grievances Department issued a Notification dated 17.03.2011, whereby, it had been ordered that the benefits of the provisions of the Assam Panchayat Employees [Provincialisation] Act, 1999 [the Act] including those for pension and other retirement dues applicable to the State Government Employees, would also be available to the provincialised Panchayat Employees who were in service on or after 01.10.1991 on the basis of the length of their service reckoned from the dates of their initial appointments in the service of Panchayats. The said Notification was issued with the concurrence of the Finance Department.
5. The PPO no. ADP/PRI/PPO/GPO/2012/000668 issued in respect of the petitioner has specifically stated that the date of petitioner’s entry in service is 01.03.1967 and the petitioner’s date of retirement is 30.06.2000. The total period of service rendered by the petitioner was 33 years 3 months 29 days. Yet, the pension disbursal authority had calculated the petitioner’s monthly pension @ Rs. 1,870/-per month w.e.f. 01.07.2000 with the observation that a period of 7 years 5 months 19 days could not be counted for the purpose of pension and the said period has not been treated as part of the qualifying service. Resultantly, the petitioner’s net qualifying service has been counted as 25 years 10 months 15 days.
6. Mr. Dutta, learned Standing Counsel, P&RD Department has submitted that the position has been settled by the Judgment and Order rendered in
The entire service period of provincialised Panchayat employees must be counted for pension calculation, rejecting any arbitrary exclusions.
Provincialized Panchayat employees are entitled to pension based on their entire service duration, not limited to sanctioned posts.
Section 2(b) defines date of appointment in relation to any employee to mean date on which he joined service of Panchayat.
The entire service period of a Panchayat employee must be considered for pension computation, not just the provincialized period.
The entire service period of a Panchayat employee must be considered for pension computation, not just the provincialized period.
Provincialized Panchayat employees are entitled to pension based on their entire service period, not limited to sanctioned posts.
The computation of pension must consider the entire length of service from the initial appointment date, not just the provincialization date.
Provincialized employees are entitled to pension benefits based on their entire length of service, not just the period post-provincialization.
Employees are entitled to pension based on the total length of their service from the initial date of appointment, despite administrative restrictions on pension eligibility calculations.
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