JUDGMENT IHSAN-UL-HAQ CHAUDHRY, J. - The petitioner through this Constitutional petition has prayed for direction to the respondents to finalize his pension papers in order to ensure payment of pension and other dues. The relevant facts are that the petitioner retired on 9.5.1997 from service as Excise & Taxation Officer after attaining age of superannuation.
2. It is argued that the petitioner had served for 37 years. The notification of his retirement was issued on 12.1.1997. The petitioner submitted the pension papers. The respondent No. 3 forwarded the same to respondent No. 2 on 25.3.1997. It is added that as per Rule 5.2 it was the responsibility of respondent No. 2 to initiate and complete pension papers and he was under legal obligation to initiate action one year before the retirement. It is added that the respondents have failed to discharge the legal obligation and failed to finalize the payment of pension to the petitioner. This way he was constrained to invoke the Constitutional jurisdiction of this Court. It is added that the petitioner is entitled Jo grant of pension forthwith.
3. I have given my anxious consideration to the arguments and gone through the record. The petition was admitted to hearing on 25.5.1998. Notices were issued to the respondents but nobody appeared on 16.7.1998 and then on 30.9.1998 when Rana Muhammad Arif, learned Addl. A.G. Who was present on Court's call, was asked to seek instructions and petition was directed to be relisted in the last week of October, 1998. The petition was taken up at about 9.30 a.m. In the morning but nobody appeared from the department side inspire of information by the learned Addl. A.G. Who requested for keeping the matter pending till after the interval so he could inform the respondents.
The petition was taken up after interval. Learned Addl. A.G. Was present but nobody on behalf of the respondents either imparted the instructions to the learned Addl. A.G. Or appeared directly in the 'Court. The respondents even did not care the courtesy to inform the learned Addl. A.G. Who time and again informed them on telephone.
4. The admitted position on record is that the petitioner retired on 9.5.1997 as Excise & Taxation Officer. In accordance with the documents on record he lodged the pension papers but the pension has not been sanctioned till today. It is relevant to record here that as per Rule 5.2 of the Pension Rules, 1955 the process of sanction of pension was to start a year before the retirement.
The purpose of the rule is that the same could be sanctioned a month before the retirement. The rule reads as under:- "The responsibility for initiation and completion of pension papers is that of the Head of Department/Attached Department concerned in the case of Gazetted Officers, and of the Head of Office concerned in the case of non-gazetted Government servants. The action should be initiated one year before a Government servant is due to retire, so that pension may be sanctioned a month before the date of his retirement provided that
(i) in case in which the date of retirement cannot be foreseen 6 months in advance, the Government servant may be asked to submit his pension application immediately after the date of his retirement is known, and
(ii) a Government servant proceeding on leave preparatory to retirement in excess of 6 months may be asked to submit his application at the time of proceeding on such leave."
It seems that the notification of retirement is issued before time with the same purpose. In this case notification of retirement of the petitioner was issued on 12.1.1997. More than 18 months have passed but the respondents have failed to finalize the issue of pension of the petitioner. This unconscious able and unjust conduct cannot be appreciated. The tragedy is that the retired civil servants suffer at the hands of their on fellowmen, who forget that one day they have also to retire. There is no justification whatsoever for sitting over the pension matter of the petitioner.
5. In this view of the matter, this writ petition is accepted with costs. The respondents are directed to expeditiously decide the matter of pension of the petitioner in any case by 31st of December, 1998.