Don't lay off or demote employees for disability: Centre

New Delhi: No government office should dispense with or reduce in rank an employee who acquires any disability during his service, the Centre has said.

The Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) has amended Central Civil Services (Pension) Rules, 1972, to make it easier for such employees to continue in service or to get invalid pension -- which is granted if a government servant retires from the service on account of any bodily or mental infirmity which permanently incapacitates him for the service.

"The case of a government servant acquiring a disability, where the provisions of Section 47 of the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1995 (1 of 1996) are applicable, shall be governed by the provisions of the said section," says the recently amended Pension rules.

The Section 47 of the Act mandates "no establishment shall dispense with or reduce in rank, an employee who acquires a disability during his service".

It also makes it mandatory for the government departments not to deny promotion to "a person merely on the ground of his disability".

If a government servant, in a case where the provisions of the Section 47 of the Act are not applicable, retires from the service on account of any bodily or mental infirmity which permanently incapacitates him for the service he may be granted invalid pension or service gratuity depending upon the length of his qualifying service on the date of retirement, the new rules said.

In case a government servant applies for an invalid pension, he shall be required to submit a medical certificate of incapacity from a medical board.