The Neyveli Lignite Corporation, a Navratna company, has set up a Benefit Coordination Cell to make sure that its former employees get their superannuation benefits and due health care services.
N.Balaji, NLC General Manager (Human Resources), who is heading the cell, told The Hindu that the company was keen that the retirees should also be duly taken care of within the framework of the rules.
Accordingly, the NLC had been making a contribution of 10 per cent of the basic pay plus dearness allowance towards pension of those who retired after January 1, 2007.
A “pension mela” is also organised periodically to redress their grievances. To render appropriate health care to retirees it had floated two schemes: the Post-Retirement Medical Assistance Scheme (PRMAS) and the Post-Retirement Medical Insurance Scheme (PRMIS).
Under the former scheme the retirees would be eligible to get treatment worth Rs 10,000 a year (as outpatients) and under the latter they would get an assistance of up to Rs 2 lakh for hospitalisation.
For meeting the expenses on this score, the NLC had been contributing 3.84 per cent of the basic pay and dearness allowance of the employees. Asked about the role of the newly formed cell, Mr Balaji said that 500 employees who died after January 1, 2007 were not given pension as the new scheme had come into effect only in March 2012.
Therefore, the cell was collecting details of those deceased employees to pass on the benefit to them.
Mr Balaji also noted that the NLC, in coordination with the Vidal Health Services and the National Insurance Company Ltd., was organising health camps to provide specialty medical services relating to orthopedics, gynecology, urology and dentistry, and, to ascertain bone density.
Mr Balaji further added that to make access to such services easier the retirees could look for the former employee link in the company’s portal and register their names.
