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Senior citizen's long wait for justice

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI FEB. 19. A senior citizen has been running from pillar to post for the past eight months to get the services of the Delhi Legal Services Authority for recovery of his provident fund which he alleged was embezzled by his private employer.

Since the petitioner, Ram Lal, does not have enough money to fight for his rightful claim, he moved an application in the Authority in May 2002 urging it to provide a lawyer who could take up his case.

The Secretary of the Authority referred the matter to a member secretary asking him to take legal opinion on his application.

The member secretary sent Mr. Lal's application to an empanelled lawyer who after going through the complaint recommended registration of a criminal case against the employer as well as the erring officials of the Provident Fund Department. However, the member secretary kept on sitting on the legal opinion for several months after summoning the employer. The matter moved recently when the senior citizen lodged a complaint with the Executive Chairman of the Authority who is the Chief Justice of the Delhi High Court against the member secretary.

Thereafter, the member secretary told the complainant that he had sent his application for an opinion about whether a civil case could also lodged in the matter. The matter is now fixed for March 3. The senior citizen said that the Authority had been doing nothing since he filed the petition except adjourning the hearing.

The complainant's grievance is that his employer, a petrol pump owner in R.K. Puram in South Delhi, in connivance with some officials of the Provident Fund Department had siphoned off the contributions to his fund.

He alleged that the employer used to deduct Rs. 200 from his monthly salary for the Provident Fund and was obliged to put in a matching amount and then deposit it to the Fund.

The senior citizen came to know about the racket in 1979 when he went to the Department for withdrawing the deposited amount. The petrol pump owner had earlier terminated him from the service. The petitioner is contesting his termination in a Labour court here.

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