Industrial employees of Military Engineering Services are entitled to Dress Allowance pursuant to 7th CPC recommendations.

The 54 applicants are industrial employees (MCM, FGM, Electricians, Mates, etc.) working under the Military Engineering Services (MES), Agra

Prior to the 7th Central Pay Commission (CPC) recommendations, they received "Dangri"/uniforms and a monthly washing allowance

Following the 7th CPC, the respondents ceased providing physical uniforms from January 1, 2016, and stopped washing allowances in March 2017

The applicants sought the grant of a consolidated "Dress Allowance" of Rs. 5,000/- per annum effective from July 1, 2017, as per Government of India Office Memoranda (OM) dated August 2, 2017, and August 31, 2017

Despite submitting representations on August 29, 2023, the respondents failed to grant the benefit, claiming the matter was still "under consideration" by the Engineer-in-Chief’s Branch

1. Whether the applicants, as industrial employees of the MES, are entitled to the Dress Allowance of Rs. 5,000/- per annum in terms of the Office Memoranda dated 02.08.2017 and 31.08.2017

2. Whether the pendency of a policy decision before the competent authority is a valid ground to deny benefits already upheld by other Benches of the Tribunal and High Courts for similarly situated employees

Government of India Office Memoranda dated 02.08.2017 and 31.08.2017, which subsumed various existing allowances (Uniform, Washing, Stitching, Shoe) into a single Dress Allowance for Group ‘C’ and erstwhile Group ‘D’ employees required to wear uniforms

Judicial precedent established in Gurmit Singh & Others v. Union of India & Others (O.A. No. 1228/2019), decided by the Chandigarh Bench on 05.06.2020, which was subsequently affirmed by the Hon’ble Punjab and Haryana High Court on 04.10.2021

The Tribunal found that the applicants were industrial employees of the MES and were objectively similarly situated to the petitioners in the Gurmit Singh case

The court noted that the respondents did not dispute the applicability of the 2017 Office Memoranda nor the fact that other MES employees had already received the benefit under court orders

The Tribunal rejected the respondents' defense that the matter was "under consideration" at the E-in-C’s Branch, New Delhi, ruling that mere administrative pendency cannot serve as a legal basis to deny a benefit already deemed admissible under existing government policy and judicial precedents

Consequently, the Tribunal determined that the applicants met the criteria of being employees supplied with uniforms and required to wear them regularly, thus qualifying for the subsumed allowance

The controversy is squarely covered by the Gurmit Singh precedent

The respondents were directed to grant the benefit of Dress Allowance to the applicants in accordance with the OM dated 31.08.2017 within four months from the date of receipt of the order

No order was made as to costs