Please help.
I am a Director in a small Pvt Ltd Co. ( 5 employees total). One of our employees who was with us for the last 10 years, suddenly resigned without reason and wanted to be relieved immediately. We relieved him as per his request and paid him his full salary for the month even though 10 days were remaining.
In his resignation letter he demanded ""gratuity/compensation"" for all his years of service. Our Company is not liable under Payment of Gratuities Act, nor even under Bonus Act or PF, although as a matter of practice we make provision for, and do pay one months salary in the guise of bonus, around Diwali each year.
We informed our ex employee that the question of paying any gratuity does not arise, but that in view of his years of service we may consider paying some sort of ex gratia amount. He reverted with a claim statement based on Gratuity calculations, whereas we intend to give him around a months salary total plus last years ""bonus"" as ex gratia full and final settlement.
My question is, can he initiate any legal proceedings to claim any further amount and if so what kind of proceedings?
Is he legally entitled to anything under any provision of law, bearing in mind that he voluntarily resigned without giving any notice and in fact caused us considerable inconvenience by his sudden resignation? In our reply to his resignation letter, we have mentioned this.
Thanks. Miharika
