24 Jan 2018

Court cases

--------------------------------------  From CHQ website    ---------------------------------------------
On 23-01-2018, Comrades P S Ramankutty, D Gopalakrishnan, R N Pada Nair (former Circle of Secretary of Kerala) and T P George (present Circle Secretary of Kerala) met Advocate Sreeraj in Kochi, Kerala and discussed about filing two cases.
  • (1) For getting arrears of pension revision with 78.2% from 01-01-2007 instead of 10-6-2013.
  • (2) For getting pension fixed at 50% of the Last Pay Drawn for all BSNL Pensioners at par with other central government pensioners, since all of us are also covered by CCS Pension rules, 1972.
We had discussion with the Advocate for more than an hour. Adv. Sreeraj is the lawyer who fought our case on Extra Increment and won. He agreed to file the two cases before CAT, Ernakulam. We handed over all relevant documents to him. After studying the papers he will finalize the Petition and take all steps to file the petitions within a period of two weeks. Com. P S Ramankutty will file it on behalf of AIBSNLPWA along with two or three pensioners from Kerala. We shall attach a list of pensioners from Kerala showing them as the beneficiaries. Since the jurisdiction of the Ernakulam CAT is Kerala state only, list of those from other circles cannot be attached at this stage. But, the Telecom Department is notorious for going on appeal to High Court and Supreme Court whenever it is defeated in Tribunals. (We have the experience of winning our case on Pension Anomaly.) In this case also we should expect the same. When the matter is taken to the Supreme Court, list of pensioners of other Circles can be attached.
We should see that our Application is not rejected on technical ground. Legal fight is to be fought very carefully. It is along drawn struggle also. In CAT benches number of Judges have retired. Vacancies are not being filled up. Hence thousands of cases are pending for years together.
When justice is denied by Government or by Department we approach the Court of Law. There is undue delay in Courts, including the Supreme Court of India. This is the sorry state of affairs of Indian Judiciary System. But people like us have no alternative.
ANOMALY CASE
Com. R L Kapoor has reported from Delhi that on 23-1-2018, High Court of Delhi took up the appeal petition filed by Department of Telecom against the verdict of CAT Principal bench given in favour of pensioners, in the case our Association had filed and won. After hearing the arguments for some time the High Court simply postted the case to 22-10-2018 saying that detailed arguments are to be heard. !!!!
Gap of Nine months.!!! Our Advocate pleaded for an early date but the High Court did not agree.