‘Maintain status quo on engineers’ salary’: CAT’s interim direction comes as relief to Kapurthala RCF employees

The applicant stated that the benefits of the second financial upgradation with a grade pay of Rs 4,800 and third financial upgradation with a grade pay of Rs 5,400 were granted to eligible employees by the Railways Modified Assured Career Progression Scheme (MACP) policy in the past. But then the Railway Board issued a letter in April 2021 as per which the upgradation was withdrawn.

The letter was issued by the Railway Board over a clarification sought by the Northern Railway Accounts Department, Baroda House, New Delhi, which was in sheer contradiction of its own earlier basic policy of the MACP Scheme dated 10-06-2009, said petitioners.

The affected employees took this matter up with the Railway Board authorities through proper channels several times, but to no avail and then they filed a petition.

The counsel for the petitioners – designated Senior Advocate Sanjeev Manrai and SP Garg – apprised the Chandigarh Bench that the order dated April 22, 2021 is uniformly applicable throughout the Indian Railways, but the RCF administration is the only one which has implemented it, that too in a “most discriminate manner” upon engineers and their equivalents alone without affecting the ministerial/clerical and accounts cadre staff promoted in the same grade pay between January 1, 2006 and August 29, 2008. This is highly “discriminatory, arbitrary, whimsical and perverse”, it said.

“The court was apprised that seven similarly situated employees i.e. Engineers & their equivalents had already retired from RCF with huge reduced basic pay causing monetary loss of pensionary benefits. However, no recovery of arrears has been done given the judgment rendered by the Supreme Court in SLP case of Rafiq Masih vs the State of Punjab,” said counsels.

The division bench of Ramesh Singh Thakur and Rashmi Saxena Sahni, having been fully convinced with the arguments advanced by the applicants, stayed the withdrawal of financial upgradation on their retirements by directing the respondents to maintain status quo – that is, there will be no reduction in the basic pay qua salary of the applicants, said the counsel.

The bench said the respondents may file a short reply qua interim by the next date.

Mohan said the order of the Chandigarh bench will benefit thousands of employees besides those who got retired without getting their due benefits in the wake of the letter.