Chief Minister’s Office Punjab has issued the official Notification letter in connection with elimination of delay in finalization of pension cases.
Chief Minister, Punjab has observed with great concern that pension cases of retiring employees are usually delayed and kept pending without any cogent reasons.
Read More: Eradication of Delay in Payment of Pension Cases
Rule 5.1 of the Punjab Civil Services Pension Rules provides that “all authorities dealing with applications for pensions under these rules should bear in mind that delay in the payment of pensions involves peculiar hardship it is essential to ensure, therefore, that a Government servant begins to receive his pension on the date on which it becomes due”.
Further, Rule 5.2 of the Rules ibid envisages that “the responsibility for initiation and completion of pension papers lies with the head of Department / Attached Department concerned. Pension cases approval process should be initiated one year before a Government servant is due to retire and pension papers, complete in all respects, should be sent to the audit officer six months before the date of retirement so that pension may be sanctioned a month before the date of his retirement”.
Since, above mentioned provisions of Punjab Civil Services Pension Rules are not being adhered to by the Pension Sanctioning Authorities, resultantly, inordinate delay continues to be caused in the payment of pension-to the retirees.
Read More: Problems Faced by Pensioners in Sanction/Drawl of Pension
In view of aforementioned, Chief Minister has been pleased to direct that;
i). A consolidated report of all Departments / Attached Departments regarding all such pending pension cases shall be provided to the Chief Minister’s Office by 30th September, 2019 through Chief Secretary.
ii). All Pension Sanctioning Authorities must ensure that all pending/under process pension cases are disposed of by 31st December, 2019.
iii). Monthly progress report regarding the disposal of pension cases by all Pension Sanctioning Authorities must be submitted to the Chief Minister’s Office by 10th of every month.
iv). In future, all pension cases must be decided strictly in the light of the Punjab Civil Services Pension Rules. In case of delay, Pension Sanctioning Authority shall furnish a justification to the office of Chief Secretary. No pendency of pension cases certificate shall also be submitted by the Pension Sanctioning Authority concerned.
It is requested that all concerned may be directed to assign top priority to the subject matter.
