1. The petitioner is a retired employee of the 1st respondent Bank. The petitioner had, on retirement, made an application to the 1st respondent Bank for gratuity and admittedly, he was paid Rs.10 Lakhs as gratuity for the service rendered; which is the maximum permissible under the Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972 (for brevity 'the Gratuity Act') as has been amended w.e.f. 24.05.2010. The payment was opposed by the Life Insurance Corporation (for brevity 'LIC'), with whom the 1st respondent Bank insured its gratuity liability.

2. The short contention of the petitioner based on Ext.P2 communication of the LIC to the respondent Bank, is that, in fact, the eligible claim of gratuity was Rs.14,37,772/-where as the claim submitted by the Bank was for only Rs.10 Lakhs. The petitioner relies on Ext.P2 communication from the LIC. The petitioner having received the amounts payable as per the Gratuity Act was again before the 1st respondent Bank for disbursing the balance amount due, as has been noticed in Ext.P2. The 1st respondent Bank declined the same by Ext.P4 wherein it was contended that as per Rule 59 of the Kerala Co-operative Societies Rules (for brevity 'the Rules'), there