IMPORTANT POINT
The jurisdiction of the Tribunal can be challenged at any stage, and disputes arising from banking relationships must be addressed in appropriate forums.

JUDGMENT :

A. Muhamed Mustaque, J.

1. The point that is to be considered primarily before this Court is as to the maintainability of the application filed by the party respondents before the Central Administrative Tribunal. Though this issue was not addressed by the Tribunal, this is a pure question of law and touching upon the inherent jurisdiction of the Tribunal. We are of the view that the question of jurisdiction can be raised even if it is the first time before this Court.

2. This original petition is filed by the Bank. The Bank is a disbursing authority of pension for the Union Government. The applicant before the Tribunal retired from the office of the Accountant General (Audit), Thrissur, on 30.04.2002 as Senior Auditor. His monthly pension was fixed at Rs.3,708/- at the time of retirement.

3. Based on the implementation of 6th Central Pay Commission, he became eligible for payment of Rs.8,412/- as a revised pension with effect from 01.01.2006 onwards. However, the Bank without deducting the commuted value of Rs.1,480/- continued to pay full pension to the applicant with effect from August 2007. This was a mistake committed by the Banking officials. Now they sought to recover the same from the respondent-applicant. This was challenged before the Tribunal. The Tribunal set aside the recovery. This is how the Bank approached this Court. The question regarding jurisdiction is essentially based on Sections 14 and 19 read with Section 3(q) of the Administrative Tribunals Act, 1985. This is not a question of any deduction made by the sanctioning authority. The Bank being a disbursing authority having a customer relationship with the respondent. The attempt of the Bank to recover from the respondent-applicant is because of the mistake committed by them. In such circumstances whether such recovery is possible or not will have to be decided based on the nature of the relationship. This issue could not have been entertained by the Tribunal in view of the fact that this is purely a dispute that arose out of a banking relationship.

4. In view of the fact that the sanctioning authority had not decided to deduct any reduction from the pension, the mistake in disbursing can be only treated as a dispute arising out of such relationship between the service provider and the customer. In such circumstances, we are of the view that the impugned order has to be set aside, paving the way for the respondent-applicant to approach this Court or any other forum to challenge such recovery in accordance with law. The forum before which the respondent-applicant may approach, shall consider the delay involved in the matter as it was due to bona fide prosecution of the challenge before the Tribunal with effect from 11.02.2016. No recovery shall be effected for a period of one month.

5. The original petition is disposed of as above.