WE the retired employees of the National Bank of Pakistan appeal to the Chief Justice of Pakistan for an early settlement of the case pending for more than five months as regards the civil review appeal filed by the bank management.

The apex court has already ruled its decision about 70pc pension for the NBP retired employees as statutory in nature and employees are entitled to it. The three members in their Supreme Court ruling on Sept 25, 2017, had also dismissed all other applications filed by the bank .

In the final annual financial report of the bank for the year 2017 , the president of the bank announced that the bank had earned a high profit of Rs23.03bn in 2017. He further said that if the pension case went against “our appeal , we have saved enough to protect the bank from any bad impact on its working and balance-sheet”.

It is worth mentioning here that the bank has deprived its shareholders of their annual dividend while fearing the financial impact of the ongoing pension case. The retired employees are in a limited number, ie 8,000 but on the other side, the number of shareholders is in the millions, and stopping their dividend is not justified whereas the bank has earned profits in the billions for the said year.

The retired employees pertaining to the period of retirement between 1999 and 2003 had badly suffered due to the rigid retirement policy of the bank. This situation led to a long legal battle between the bank management and the retired employees.

During this process of legal proceedings many of them have died while the remaining ones have crossed the age of 80 and at this stage they are not in a position to carry on their efforts but seek the president’s mercy. They hope relief is granted by the apex court.

Mahmood Ahmad Minhas

Lahore

Published in Dawn, May 28th, 2018