KARACHI, July 5: The Federal Service Tribunal has directed the National Petroleum Refinery and Petro Chemical Corporation (Perac) to recalculate the pensionary benefits of its former chief medical officer, who retired in 1998 after putting in 33 years of pensionable service and pay him his dues accordingly. Dr Abdul Aziz joined the National Cement Industries (Dalmia Cement) in 1965. The factory was taken over by the Cement Corporation of Pakistan and he was transferred to Javedan Cement as their senior medical officer. In 1989 his services were acquired by the National Refinery Limited (NRL), a Perac project which appointed him its chief medical officer. He became a member of the Perac staff pension scheme in 1991.

The doctor retired in 1998 but his pensionable service was arbitrarily curtailed to 15 years. It was maintained that omission of Javedan Cement and inaction of the NRL caused shortfall in pension back funding. Dr Aziz challenged the decision and said certain employees were allowed the benefit of back funding.

An FST bench, comprising Qazi Mohammad Hussain Siddiqui and Rashid Ali Mirza held that shortfall in back funding had all along been provided by NRL and Perac under a Perac Board decision taken in 1987 despite the absence of a rule to the effect. There, however, appears to be confusion in the respondents’ managements about payment or non-payment of the shortfall.

The bench observed: “We find that the appellant has been subjected to discrimination. We are conscious that if rules do not permit payment of any amount, plea of discrimination cannot be availed. But in the instant case, the matter is otherwise. Certain employees who approached the federal ombudsman were given the benefit of back funding. Lack of resources was cited as a reason but in our opinion a proper decision by the Perac Board should have been stoppage of induction of employees from other organizations into NRL or Perac by way of transfer”.

Allowing the appeal, the bench asked the respondents to recalculate his pension and pay him his dues.