When an employee who has nominated his parents for General Provident Fund (GPF) gets married, the nomination in favour of his parents becomes invalid, ruled the Supreme Court.
A Defence Accounts Department employee had nominated his mother in the year 2000 for GPF, Central Government Employees Group Insurance Scheme (CGEGIS), as well as Death cum Retirement Gratuity (DCRG). When he got married three years later, he updated nominations only for CGEGIS and DCRG in favour of his wife, but did not update the GPF nomination. When the said employee passed away in 2021, the wife was denied GPF, as the old nomination was in favour of her mother-in-law.
However, the Supreme Court noted that when an employees gets married, the nomination made in favour of a parent becomes nonexistent and invalid; it gets automatically terminated. The parents cannot claim priority over the spouse. As per Rule 33 of the GPF (Central Service) Rules, 1960, the GPF should be equally distributed among the eligible family members of the deceased employee, in this case his wife and mother.
Therefore, Live Law.in reports that a bench comprising Justices Sanjay Karol and N Kotiswar Singh quashed the Bombay High Court’s decision, and restored the Central Administrative Tribunal’s decision to ensure that the GPF amount is distributed equally between the deceased’s wife and mother. According to the apex court, just because the mother was nominated, her claim does not become superior to that of the deceased employee’s wife.