Sarabjit Parida had been working with 1 Above pub for only three months, but this was possible due to provisions of the EPF Act
Sarabjit was the only child of Samarendra and Basanti Parida
Parents of the only staff member (of 1Above restaurant) who died in the Kamala Mills fire on December 29, 2017, will now get a monthly pension. This was possible due to provisions in the EPF Act, which state that in case of an employee who dies during his employment period, the claim will be settled immediately. Officials at the Employees' Provident Fund Organisation (EPF), Bandra office, said this is the first such case there, wherein an employee's kin got these benefits despite the short span of his employment, about three months.
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Sarabjit Parida, 23, was a graduate in commerce and had done a course in hotel management. He had already done five months of internship with J W Marriot in Indore and had accompanied his cousin Prakash Naik, who was already working in a restaurant in Mumbai, sometime in August 2017. Naik said, "Sarabjit had taken up a job in a restaurant in Chowpatty but was not enjoying work there and quit it within a week. He then joined 1Above in October and was happy working there. He was confident of getting promoted as a manger, when the incident happened. He was the only child of his parents who are working on a farm and were dependent on his earnings."
Samarendra and Basanti Parida
EPF clears pension
Pankaj Raman, Regional Provident Fund Commissioner, Bandra, said, "As we had carried out an inspection at 1Above before the fire, and learnt about the demise of Parida in it later, we traced his parents and completed all the formalities, and have already cleared his pension (whatever was contributed in the three months that he worked there)."
He said as per their records, as his UAN (Universal Account Number) and PAN (Permanent Account Number) cards were already linked to the EPF account, they could easily reach out to his parents and after filling the necessary forms, they have already started giving them a monthly pension of Rs 2,266 (his parents will get arrears from December 30, 2017) and the pension payment order (PPO) was cleared on February 6, 2018.
"We processed all the papers within a short span of four working days, after receiving all the forms duly filled in by the parents. This is as per our Prime Minister, Narendra Modi's moto, that social security is every worker's right and in case of death of any working employee, the claims should be settled at the earliest," said Raman.
Another EPF staffer added, "Apart from a pension of Rs 2,266, the provident fund contribution of Rs 3,460 and insurance of Rs 3,939 (for three months) as per the table, has been paid to the parents. The pension amount will be paid to his father Samarendra Parida till he is alive and then to his mother Basanti after the demise of her husband till she is alive."
First such case in EPF, Bandra
When asked if this was being done for the first time as a special case, the officer replied in the affirmative, stating that this is the first such case in the EPF, Bandra office.
There are provisions in the EPF act that say in case an employee dies, during his employment period, the claim will be settled immediately. When contacted, Samarendra, who hails from a small village in Patapurbada, Pratpada, Bhuwaneshwar, Odisha, he could not understand Hindi or English. When asked about the source of the money that EPF had to pay the parents life-long, an officer said, "We use the money that is in the corpus of the Central Board of Trustees, Delhi, who invest all EPF money and get returns on those investments, which are used to provide social security to the next of kin of the deceased."
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