OROP OR NOT, LIC PENSIONERS CAN KEEP HOPES VERY MUCH ALIVE

Referring to the post of Mr Sreenivasa Murty,I am inclined to agree with him that our case for pension revision stands on a footing different from OROP purely on the strength of legal grounds which hopefully the Supreme Court can be expected to take note of. The ploy of financial burden cannot stand in view of the Chapter III of LIC Pension Rules,1995 imposing an obligation on LIC to maintain adequate amounts in  the pension fund  to meet its obligations from time to time.LIC Pension Rules, 1995  notified by the Central Government constitutes subordinate legislation. Also the magnitude of financial  burden  arising for LIC will pale into insignificance compared to that for the Central Government on account of OROP.The interest earned  by LIC  every year on the pension fund  is  much more than  the annual pension outgo. If the Central Government has to deny upward revisions to LIC pensioners, then they may need to rethink on continuing upgradation for its pensioners after every Pay Commission recommendations. Any decision to discontinue the present practice and stop upgradation will both be legally questionable and will be attended by a huge political cost. The Senior advocate's poser to Mr Murty is very valid as no authority however officially empowered it may be ,cannot  take a decision affecting the stakeholders at large  in a manner that will violate  the articles 14 & 16 of the Constitution. The context of the Board Resolution was only the need to remove the DR anomalies faced by the pre-August 1997 retirees when wage revisions due 1/8/2002 had not been notified. But the judgment of the Single Judge at Jaipur,by allowing both the petitions, not only  ordered DR anomaly removal, but also upgradation of pension for both pre-August 1997  & later period  retirees, although there was a direction to LIC to take steps to implement the Board Resolution. Any improvement in pension short of upgradation benefiting  only  a restricted group of pensioners like only pre-August 1997 retirees is sure to give rise  to further anomalies in future with a perpetual potential for vexatious  litigation which LIC & Government  may not be bothered about, but will result in  a painful struggle for the aged pensioners. We are already witness to the reduction   of family pension arising out of the deliberately wrong and faulty approach of LIC  in (mis)interpreting the Board Resolution. All of us need  to empathise with the family pensioners suffering in silence in the absence of pension revision whose plight is  much worse than  that of the regular pensioners. Let us hope  that all the counsel of the three  sets of  original petitioners converge on a common  platform with a   firm prayer before the Supreme Court for both removal of DR anomaly and upgradation of pension when final hearing is resumed on 23rd September 2015. Greetings. C H Mahadevan