Employer must give alternative job to disabled staff, says HC

CRITICISING the police department for failing to accommodate the request of one of its employees with a disability seeking an alternative role despite its legal obligation to do so, the Madras High Court has directed the department to reinstate the employee with 50% back wages for the period he was unable to work.

- R SIVAKUMAR @Chennai

Law safeguards employees who acquire any disability during service from being dispensed with or reduced in rank by employer, the court said.

A division bench comprising justices R Subramanian and G Arul Murugan recently dismissed the Greater Chennai Police's (GCP's) appeals against a single-judge order in favour of the employee, K Sakthivel.

Sakthivel was recruited in 2005 as a syce – one who takes care of horses – in the Mounted Branch of the GCP. In 2009, he suffered a disability, which a medical board later diagnosed as right knee post-traumatic sequelae and certified him to have incurred a 40% disability.