The borrowing organization is responsible for disbursing salary arrears during an employee's foreign deputation, not the parent department.

JUDGMENT :

Johnson John, J.

As per the impugned order, the Kerala Administrative Tribunal directed the State Government to ensure that arrears of pay revision along with interest due to the applicants for the period when they were on foreign deputation are sanctioned and disbursed to them within a period of one month.

2. The State Government and the parent Department are challenging the above order on the ground that employees on foreign deputation are entitled to draw their arrears of salary only from the borrowing organization.

3. It is not in dispute that while respondents 1 and 2 herein were working in the General Education Department, they opted for deputation to the 3^rd respondent Corporation and the dispute is regarding the arrears of pay during the period of deputation.

4. The learned Government Pleader argued that when an employee is on deputation, it is the duty of the foreign employer to release the pay to the employee and the same cannot be claimed from the parent Department.

5. The learned counsel for respondents 1 and 2 would point out that as per clause 9 in Annexure A1 Circular No.46/2016/Fin. dated 19.05.2016, it is the duty of the Drawing and Disbursing Officer of the parent Department to draw and disburse the arrears. But, the learned Government Pleader would point out that clause 9 in Annexure A1 is subject to clause 3 which reads thus:

“The foreign employer should remit the total amount of arrear in lump for the period from 01.07.2014 to 31.01.2016 or upto the period they have worked on deputation along with interest at the rate of 8.7% per annum for the period from 01.02.2016 to the date of remittance, before 31.03.2017. The details of remittance to Government account along with the copy of Pay-in-slip should be forwarded to the Drawing and Disbursing Officer concerned in the parent department.”

6. Admittedly, the foreign employer has not remitted any amount to the Government as required in clause 3 of Annexure A1 and in that circumstance, it cannot be held that the Drawing and Disbursing Officer of the parent Department is liable to draw and disburse the arrears of salary as per clause 9 in Annexure A1.

7. In State of Punjab v. Inder Singh [(1997) 8 SCC 372], the Honourable Supreme Court, after considering the concept of deputation and the particular rights and liabilities associated with deputation, which occurs only with the consent of the employee, held as follows:

“18. The concept of “deputation” is well understood in service law and has a recognised meaning. “Deputation” has a different connotation in service law and the dictionary meaning of the word “deputation” is of no help. In simple words “deputation” means service outside the cadre or outside the parent department. Deputation is deputing or transferring an employee to a post outside his cadre, that is to say, to another department on a temporary basis. After the expiry period of deputation the employee has to come back to his parent department to occupy the same position unless in the meanwhile he has earned promotion in his parent department as per the Recruitment Rules. Whether the transfer is outside the normal field of deployment or not is decided by the authority who controls the service or post from which the employee is transferred. There can be no deputation without the consent of the person so deputed and he would, therefore, know his rights and privileges in the deputation post. The law on deputation and repatriation is quite settled as we have also seen in various judgments which we have referred to above. ...”

8. In Umapati Choudhary v. State of Bihar [(1999) 4 SCC 659], the Honourable Supreme Court considered the tripartite nature of a deputation and held as under:

“8. Deputation can be aptly described as an assignment of an employee (commonly referred to as the deputationist) of one department or cadre or even an organisation (commonly referred to as the parent department or lending authority) to another department or cadre or organisation