By PTI
INDORE: The Madhya Pradesh High Court has criticised State Bank India (SBI) officials for adopting an “inhuman approach” while dealing with a case of appointment on compassionate grounds, and directed the bank to pay Rs 2 lakh to a woman petitioner.
The order was issued by the single bench of Justice Vivek Rusia on Monday while admitting a writ petition filed by Meena Dhaigude against a general manager and chief manager (personnel administration) of SBI in 2012.
“In my considered opinion it is a fit case in which exemplary cost should be imposed on the respondents for their inhuman approach. The way the respondents have dealt with the issue of the widow and children of a Class IV employee, it is liable to denounce with the strong words deprecated,” Justice Rusia stated in the order.
Expressing anguish over the bank management’s style of working, the court noted that the petitioner had to work as a domestic help for the survival of her sons and herself.
The court also ordered the bank to consider the woman’s application for appointment on compassionate grounds.
The petitioner’s lawyer Anand Agrawal said the woman’s husband Ashok Dhaigude was working in the then State Bank of Indore (which was later merged with the State Bank of India) as a peon.
Dhaigude left for work from his home on December 19, 1998 and disappeared, he said, adding that even after lodging a police complaint when Dhaigude remained missing for the next seven years, his wife applied for appointment on compassionate grounds.
However, the bank management did not consider her plea for years, and Dhaigude was considered dead by the bank on October 21, 2005, Agrawal said.