BEST ex-employees battle for ₹600-crore dues

After dedicating over three decades of their life to Mumbai's public transport undertaking BEST, Ajay Naik and Nitin Herlekar pictured a secure retirement, with plans of investment and a chance to focus on their families.

- Karuna Nidhi

MUMBAI: However, their dreams went for a toss after BEST, citing financial difficulties, failed to pay retirement benefits to its employees.

Forced to once more take recourse to the judiciary, 127 retired employees, including ex-chief engineers and ex-assistant general managers, approached the Bombay high court in April 2023 against BMC and BEST for violating their statutory obligations, which included non-payment of encashment of balance leave at the time of retirement, pending bills of encashment of leave while in employment, leave travel assistance, payment of difference in pay scales from December 2020, and payment of the ex-gratia amount declared and paid by the undertaking from year to year.