No lockdown benefits for staff on leave: LIC

Setting terms for absence from duty during the lockdown period, state-owned Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) has clarified that 'work-fromhome' consideration is not applicable to employees who are away from their office location.

The direction from India's largest insurer follows queries from various offices/zones as how to treat absence from duty of staff during the lockdown period. An official notification issued on Tuesday evening listed out how employee absence from duty will be treated during the period.

When contacted, an LIC official said, "We have underlined six important conditions. The 'workfrom-home' condition is the most important one, in which the employee is not permitted when he/she is out of the head quarter. Besides, employees who have left HQs for personal reasons, but are unable to return to the HQ due to lockdown, will be sanctioned privilege leave (PL). Such employees will have to produce a medical certificate of fitness from the designated health authority before being permitted to join duty apart from following the directives of the state governments regarding quarantine."

In case of home quarantine, employees on quarantine following medical advice would be sanctioned sick leave (SL)/PL on medical grounds. "Also, employees advised quarantine by the office (due to family member(s)/self returning from abroad) will be sanctioned PL. Besides, the employees have been advised to selfquarantine if they have come in contact with an infected person(s) in the course of duty. The period of quarantine will be sanctioned as special leave (SL) and the zonal manager incharge will be the sanctioning authority of SL for all the employees working under the zone."

The notification said, "for all the employees working in the central office, the sanctioning authority is the executive director (E&OS)."

In case an official is on tour and he/she is unable to return to HQ, the same may be referred to the central office through the zonal manager for sanction of SL. "In case of non availability of leave balance to the credit of the employee, the absence has to be treated as extra-ordinary leave (loss of pay)," it said.