Predicament of Retired employees of Regional Rural Bank is started due to the legal fight
between legal father ( Government
) and obedient son( Employees of RRBS). The hardships and legal piteous state of
the retired employees of Regional
Rural Banks (popularly known as Gramin Banks) and their family members is increasing due to the denial of pension
to this section of employees.
The fact is that on 30.04.90, NIT,
constituted with the consent of then GOI has awarded salary at par with com banks
which is implemented in Gramin Banks but pension alike sponsor bank is not
implemented thus deliberately it is d-linked . Now 1.34 lacs of Gramin Bank
staffs appealing pension matter to
resolve.
The RRB's were established by GOI as per
RRB Act in 1976. The employees recruited at the beginning of the Banks
began to retire in
the last two decades
in large numbers. They along with
their family members are in dire straits
due to lack
of an appropriate income after
retirement. The mounting
health problems in old age rendered them helpless
for seeking further employment. A good number of
them has succumbed to health
problems and they
are no more
in this world..
While all the Govt .Employees ,public sector employees and bank employees in public
sector and private sector who had
worked in the same economic sphere were paid pension,
the inexplicable hardships faced by this
section of employees were not
considered in spite of appeals
made before all authorities.
Consequent upon the appeals made by
employees the Division
Benches of Honourable
Karnataka High Court & Rajasthan High Court in
2011
& 2012 respectively, directed
to implement
a pension scheme at
par with the pension schemes of commercial banks. Nevertheless GOI choose to file
an SLP no. 39288/2012 against
this judgement in the Honourable Supreme Court, causing much heartburn to the
employees. 80% rural development programs of govt of India are being
implemented via Gramin Banks even maximum nos of Hon-Modi’s dream project of
Jan-Dhan -Yojna a/cs are covered by Gramin Banks. For Gramin Bank staff pension
is not a luxury but means for survival this right
to live is
restraint by the govt by
filing SLP CIVI-39288 in the supreme court , thus pension is right of RRBs employees & in not allowing this to RRB staff govt
is violating the human rights of RRB staff.
On hearing the petition several time the Honourable
Supreme Court directed
GOI to reach an amicable settlement in their
interim order dated 26.11.2014.
It is understood that an affidavit
is filed by GOI on 10.07.2015 agreeing in principle
for payment of pension to employees, but in practice the conditions imposed are so restrictive in nature,
that
the pension cannot be paid
by the entire
56 RRB's barring one or two RRB's which can comply
with the rigorous stipulations of capital
adequacy and profitability.
The RRB,s were designed to cater to the needs of
rural people and rural
development. They were
the implementing agencies of poverty alleviation
programmes of GOI like
IRDP,
SFDA, 20 point programme, MGNREGS etc. As the Banks branches were situated in the remote villages
of the country, they became the sole agencies for implementing these programmes.
The RRB,s were in
the forefront for implementing social security
programmes of PMJJBY
,PMSBY,PMJDY etc. The statistics
with RBI will reveal that
a major chunk
of pro -poor programmes
were implemented by RRB's. It will
be cruel to expect
huge profit from Institutions implementing these pro-poor programmes
in large volume
in
rural areas. Where as GOI in their
affidavit had linked
payment of pension with capital adequacy and profitability without addressing
the lacunas pointed
out as above. Moreover
the Honourable Supreme Court has reiterated
in several judgements that the
pension has to be treated as deferred wages and the
capacity to pay should not be an impediment to pay pension. In the affidavit filed a
condition is imposed for 30%
contributions from
employees towards pension
corpus fund where
as in commercial banks no such
contributions were demanded when pension
scheme were introduced
for the first
time. The Banks were contributing
10 % of pay towards CPF before implementing
pension and it was appropriated
to pension corpus.
In RRB's the contributions by the Banks were limited
to Rs.650 per month even when
the pay is Rs.65000 per month on
an average,, thus making only
below 1% of
the pay as employers
contributions to CPF ,as the employees were covered under EPFO. Though this anomaly
was recommended
for removal as early as
in 1992 by
Gupta committee appointed
by GOI, this was not
implemented .
It is unfortunate that GOI
demands a share
from employees to enable
them to pay pension
before the Banks were asked to
make up the legally obligatory contribution of 10 %
of pay to their CPF of the employees for the period
they have worked .If this is
worked out and
implemented, this itself
will be sufficient for making
the pension corpus fund.
The employees who have
retired will not
be able to
contribute this alarming sum to have pension, as many
of them might have
used up their
savings by this time. So
the Govt should take a decision to implement pension scheme in RRB's at par
with pension schemes of commercial banks , in order to
mitigate the agonies
of
the retired employees of these banks as
well as their
family members.
It is known to all that delayed
justice is denied
justice and the
affected persons were senior citizens of the country and
they were waiting for the
last two decades hoping for a honourable pension. Out of them more than 4000
have already left this world due to financial problem. Now the supreme court of
India
adjourned the date of hearing of the case
till second week
of July and so on and at last on 25 th April 2018 the Supreme court of India has given her verdict in favour of retirees of regional rural bank. SC orders the government of India to implement pension scheme at par commercial banks within 90 days. But the government of India fails to implement pension scheme within stipulated days, for which retirees are are compelled to lodge contempt case on 7 th September, 2018. Now the fate of poor retirees depend upon the Supreme court again.
We observe that in a democratic country like our India government should not behave just like a criminal person and the govt should not let their moral duty in such a way up to judicial department of the country. The government should not forget her moral duty to protect the interest of senior citizens.
N. B. Edited the article on 10/09/2018
We observe that in a democratic country like our India government should not behave just like a criminal person and the govt should not let their moral duty in such a way up to judicial department of the country. The government should not forget her moral duty to protect the interest of senior citizens.
N. B. Edited the article on 10/09/2018
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