Resignation from central government service

Resignation from central government service is the voluntary and unconditional relinquishment of a civil post by the person holding it, effective only when the appointing authority accepts it and the government servant is relieved of duty, and it carries the forfeiture of all past qualifying service under Rule 26(1) of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021. Neither the CCS (Conduct) Rules, 1964 nor the CCS (CCA) Rules, 1965 define the word.

The cost is asymmetric and badly understood. A central government employee who resigns after 28 years loses exactly what an employee who resigns after 28 months loses: everything built on qualifying service. There is no pension, no retirement gratuity, and no compassionate allowance, because the compassionate allowance in Rule 41 reaches only dismissal and removal. What survives is narrow and specific: the General Provident Fund balance, half the earned leave at credit up to 150 days, and, for post-2003 entrants, the National Pension System corpus on premature-exit terms.

Two carve-outs make the difference between losing a career’s service and keeping it. A technical resignation, tendered to take up another government post applied for through proper channel, is excluded from forfeiture by Rule 26(2). A resignation submitted for permanent absorption in a State Government or in a corporation or company is excluded by Rule 26(8). Both turn on permission obtained in advance, which is why the single most expensive mistake in this area is applying for the new post without routing the application through proper channel.

The procedural side has barely moved in nearly forty years. DoPT OM No. 28034/25/87-Estt.(A) dated 11 February 1988 remains the operative consolidated instruction, supplemented by OM No. 28034/4/94-Estt.(A) dated 31 May 1994 on mandatory vigilance clearance and OM No. 28035/2/2007-Estt.(A) dated 4 December 2007 on relaxation of the withdrawal window. The financial side, by contrast, has changed substantially since 2024, as the Unified Pension Scheme and the NPS gratuity rules each acquired an express resignation clause.

This article sets out the definition and the moment a resignation takes effect, how it differs from the seven other ways of leaving central government service, the mechanics of Rule 26, the notice and acceptance process, the three separate windows in which a resignation can be withdrawn, and an itemised account of what is paid and what is lost.

Definition and the moment it takes effect

The working definition is executive rather than statutory. A resignation is “an intimation in writing sent to the competent authority by the incumbent of a post, of his intention or proposal to resign the office/post either immediately or from a future specified date”, and it “has to be clear and unconditional” (paragraph 1, DoPT OM No. 28034/25/87-Estt.(A) dated 11 February 1988). A letter hedged with conditions, or one that asks for terms, is not a resignation at all.

The Supreme Court’s test has two limbs. Resignation means the spontaneous relinquishment of one’s own right, and to be complete and operative there must be both the intention to relinquish the office and the concomitant act of relinquishment (Moti Ram v. Param Dev, (1993) 2 SCC 725, decided 5 March 1993, paragraphs 16 and 18). Whether relinquishment is unilateral or bilateral depends on the nature of the office and the conditions governing it.

For a civil servant the act is bilateral, and two things must happen. A resignation becomes effective when it is accepted and the government servant is relieved of his duties (paragraph 3 of the 1988 OM). Acceptance alone does not sever the relationship, which is the point on which the largest volume of litigation turns.

The pension rules fix the date with precision. The day on which a government servant is allowed to resign from service is treated as his last completed working day (Rule 5(2), CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021), and it is from that day that the 90-day windows in Rule 26(5) and in the NPS rules are counted.

One consequence follows directly. Because acceptance is a decision and not a formality, there is no such thing as a resignation that takes effect by lapse of time. A letter sitting unactioned on a file for six months has produced no legal effect whatever, and the government servant remains in service, drawing pay and bound by the CCS (Conduct) Rules, 1964.

The exit routes and how they differ

Eight distinct mechanisms end central government service, and the differences between them are worth more than any other single piece of knowledge in this area. Choosing the wrong one, or being placed in one by default, decides whether a career’s service counts.

The pairing that causes most damage is the first against the third. Both are voluntary, both are initiated by the employee, and the paperwork looks similar to anyone who has not read Rule 43. Only one of them leaves a pension.

The Supreme Court closed the door on rescuing the wrong choice after the event. Resignation forfeits past service under Rule 26, the length of service is legally irrelevant once resignation is chosen, and a court cannot re-characterise a resignation as a voluntary retirement (Ashok Kumar Dabas v. Delhi Transport Corporation, 2025 INSC 1404, decided 9 December 2025, following BSES Yamuna Power Ltd. v. Ghanshyam Chand Sharma, (2020) 3 SCC 346).

Forfeiture of past service under Rule 26

Rule 26 of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021 is headed “Forfeiture of service on resignation” and carries the same rule number it carried in the 1972 Rules, so references in older departmental files map across without translation. The sub-rule numbering did shift: the withdrawal conditions sat at sub-rules (4) to (6) in 1972 and sit at sub-rules (5) to (7) in 2021.

Sub-rule (1) is the operative provision: resignation from a service or a post, unless it is allowed to be withdrawn in the public interest by the appointing authority, entails forfeiture of past service. Nothing in the rule graduates the consequence by length of service, grade, or reason for leaving.

Sub-rule (2) carries the technical-resignation exclusion, for a resignation submitted to take up, with proper permission, another appointment, whether temporary or permanent, under the Government where service qualifies. Sub-rule (3) requires the order accepting such a resignation to record that fact, and requires the Head of Office to make a specific entry in the service book.

Sub-rule (8) protects the absorption route: a resignation submitted for the purpose of Rule 35 or Rule 36 does not entail forfeiture of past service under the Government. Rule 35 covers absorption in or under a State Government, and Rule 36 covers absorption in or under a corporation, company or body.

Permission is the hinge on which both exclusions turn, and it is not curable afterwards. Where a government servant resigned to join a public sector undertaking without obtaining permission, the exception simply did not apply and the past service went (Union of India v. Braj Nandan Singh, (2005) 8 SCC 325).

Sub-rule (4) deals with a narrow timing problem. Where the two appointments are at different stations and an interruption results, the gap is covered by leave due or by formal condonation, provided it does not exceed the permissible joining time.

The technical-resignation carve-out

There is no separate power in Rule 26 to declare a resignation “technical”. The classification comes from Rule 26(2) read with the criterion in Ministry of Finance OM No. 3379-E.III(B)/65 dated 17 June 1965, as consolidated by the DoPT instructions on technical resignation and lien dated 24 November 2022.

The criterion is functional. A resignation is treated as a technical formality where the servant applied through proper channel for a post in the same or another Department and, on selection, is required to resign for administrative reasons, and the benefit is available even if the word “Technical” was never used in the letter (paragraph 2.1.1 of the 24 November 2022 instructions). Departments that reject claims because the letter said only “resignation” are applying a test the instruction does not contain.

Two situations defeat the claim outright. The benefit is not available where the competent authority refused to forward the application through proper channel, and it is not available at all for a post held on an ad hoc basis.

A narrow extension covers the person who applied before joining government service, so could not have routed the application through proper channel. Three conditions apply cumulatively: the servant intimates the details immediately on joining, specifically requests at the time of resignation that it is to take up another government appointment applied for earlier, and the accepting authority satisfies itself that the application would have been forwarded (paragraph 2.1.2 of the 24 November 2022 instructions, citing DoPT OM No. 13/24/92-Estt(Pay-I) dated 22 January 1993).

Where the destination is a Central public enterprise and permission was obtained, the treatment is different again and better. The servant is deemed to have retired from service from the date of resignation and is eligible for retirement and terminal benefits (paragraph 8, DoPT OM dated 11 February 1988, now Rule 36 read with Rule 26(8)). This is permanent absorption, not an ordinary exit.

The lien sits behind all of this. A permanent government servant appointed in another central department, office or State Government must resign the parent post unless he reverts within two years, or three years in exceptional cases where confirmation has not happened within two years, on a fresh undertaking.

Notice period

For a temporary government servant the position is statutory and symmetrical. The services of a temporary government servant are liable to termination at any time by a notice in writing given either by the servant to the appointing authority or by the appointing authority to the servant, and the period of such notice is one month (Rule 5(1)(a) and 5(1)(b), CCS (Temporary Service) Rules, 1965).

The proviso to that rule is read backwards more often than any other provision in this area. It allows service to be terminated forthwith, in which case the servant is entitled to claim pay plus allowances for the notice period, or for the shortfall. It is a compensation provision running in the employee’s favour, and it creates no right in the employee to buy out his own notice by paying a month’s pay.

The one-month notice route is legally distinct from resignation, and mixing them up costs people their exit. Where the letter does not invoke Rule 5(1) or ask to be treated as a notice of termination, the servant can relinquish charge only after acceptance and relief, not on expiry of the notice period (paragraph 4, DoPT OM dated 11 February 1988). Where Rule 5(1) is invoked, the instructions on acceptance of resignation do not apply at all.

For a permanent government servant no notice period is prescribed anywhere in the CCS rule set. This is not an oversight: resignation is not a unilateral right exercisable by notice, so there is nothing for a notice period to run against. The three-month figure that appears on almost every aggregator belongs to Rule 43(1) on voluntary retirement, to Rule 42(2) on premature retirement, and to bank and public-sector service regulations of the kind considered in Punjab National Bank v. P.K. Mittal, 1989 Supp (2) SCC 175.

A probationer is a temporary servant until confirmation, so Rule 5(1) governs, unless the letter of appointment provides its own termination terms, in which case action is taken in terms of the letter of appointment. Service on probation against a post counts as qualifying service only if it is followed by confirmation in the same or another post (Rule 16, CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021).

Acceptance, vigilance clearance and the accepting authority

The default is acceptance. It is not in the interest of Government to retain an unwilling government servant in service, so the general rule is that a resignation should be accepted, subject only to the listed exceptions (paragraph 2, DoPT OM dated 11 February 1988).

Competence to accept lies with the appointing authority for the service or post. Where acceptance is considered necessary in the public interest in a suspension or inquiry case, prior approval is needed from the Head of the Department for Group C and Group D posts and from the Minister in charge for Group A and Group B posts. For Group B officers of the Indian Audit and Accounts Department the prior approval of the Comptroller and Auditor General is required, and OM No. 28034/4/94-Estt.(A) dated 31 May 1994 additionally allows Heads of Department designated by the Comptroller and Auditor General to accept resignations across Groups A to D of that department.

Vigilance clearance is mandatory in every case, without exception for grade or circumstance. The authority competent to accept the resignation shall insist, as a mandatory measure, on prior vigilance clearance before taking a decision on the request, and the authority competent to accord clearance must consider it expeditiously (paragraph 3, OM dated 31 May 1994). The instruction was issued because resignations had been accepted without clearance and serious irregularities surfaced afterwards, by which point the department had lost its jurisdiction over the person.

Central Vigilance Commission concurrence is a separate requirement layered on top. It must be obtained before the case goes to the Minister in charge or to the Comptroller and Auditor General, where the Commission had advised initiation of departmental action or where such action was initiated on its advice.

Retrospective acceptance is contemplated in exactly one situation. Where a servant is selected by a public sector undertaking or an autonomous body, no lien is retained, the relieving order must state the period, normally not more than 15 days, within which he must join, and the order accepting the resignation is issued from the actual date of joining the new organisation. The gap between relieving and joining is regulated as leave due, or as extraordinary leave if none is due.

Dues are settled separately from acceptance. Rule 67 of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021 puts the duty on the Head of Office to ascertain and assess government dues, Rules 68 and 69 govern adjustment and recovery of dues relating to government accommodation, and Rule 55 requires intimation to the Directorate of Estates for issue of a No Demand Certificate. The last pay certificate follows the same chain.

Suspension, pending inquiry and criminal proceedings

The instruction on suspension is a strong presumption, not a prohibition, and this is the distinction that departments most often get wrong in both directions. Where a government servant under suspension submits a resignation, the competent authority must examine, with reference to the merits of the disciplinary case pending, whether acceptance would be in the public interest.

Because government servants are placed under suspension only in cases of grave delinquency, the 1988 OM records that it would not be correct to accept a resignation from a servant under suspension. Three express exceptions follow: the alleged offences do not involve moral turpitude, the quantum of evidence is not strong enough to justify the assumption that continued proceedings would end in removal or dismissal, or the proceedings are likely to be so protracted that acceptance would be cheaper to the public exchequer.

The 1994 OM widened the same treatment to cases where no suspension has been ordered. Where an official against whom an inquiry or investigation is pending submits a resignation, whether or not he is under suspension, the resignation should not normally be accepted, and acceptance in the public interest requires the case to be measured against the same three conditions.

A fourth ground has nothing to do with misconduct. Where the government servant is engaged on work of importance and it would take time to make alternative arrangements for filling the post, the resignation should not be accepted straightway but only once those arrangements have been made.

Bond obligations are treated by destination rather than by amount. The terms of the bond need not be enforced against those who apply for appointment elsewhere, other than private employment, through proper channel, and the obligations are instead carried forward to the new employment on an undertaking obtained before relief. The negative implication is plain enough: the bond is enforced on a resignation to take up private employment.

Private employment carries its own sequencing rule, and it is the reverse of what most people assume. A government servant seeking permission to apply for private employment must submit his resignation or notice of retirement before applying, and cannot complain of hardship if his application is withheld, because the State can legitimately refuse to surrender its claim on his services in favour of a private employer.

Withdrawal of a resignation: three windows

Three legally distinct situations are routinely collapsed into one, and the rights available in each are entirely different.

Before acceptance. Where a government servant sends a written intimation to the appointing authority withdrawing his earlier letter of resignation before its acceptance, the resignation is deemed to have been automatically withdrawn and there is no question of accepting it (paragraph 3, OM dated 11 February 1988). No discretion is involved and no reasons are required.

This tracks the Constitution Bench. A prospective resignation leaves the jural relationship intact until the stated date, so the resignor retains a locus poenitentiae to withdraw before that date; till acceptance in consonance with the governing rules the public servant retains that liberty, but not thereafter (Union of India v. Gopal Chandra Misra, (1978) 2 SCC 301, decided 15 February 1978).

After acceptance but before relief. The normal principle is to allow the request to withdraw, and if the request is to be refused, the grounds for rejection must be duly recorded by the appointing authority and suitably intimated to the government servant (paragraph 3 of the 1988 OM). A refusal that is neither recorded nor communicated fails on the face of it.

The courts reach the same result by a different route. Acceptance without relief does not sever the relationship, so where an employee continued to be paid until an actual release date, the jural relationship subsisted until release and he could withdraw in the interval (Shambhu Murari Sinha v. Project and Development India Ltd., (2002) 3 SCC 437, decided 13 March 2002). Withdrawal of a prospective resignation is permissible even after acceptance has been communicated, absent a contrary rule (Srikantha S.M. v. Bharath Earth Movers Ltd., Civil Appeal No. 1404 of 2003, decided 7 October 2005).

The most recent restatement is from 2024, and it names the limits. In the absence of anything contrary in the provisions governing the terms and conditions of the office or post, and in the absence of any legal, contractual or constitutional bar, a prospective resignation can be withdrawn at any time before it becomes effective, subject to two exceptions: a legal, contractual or constitutional bar on withdrawal, and the employer having already made arrangements, acting on the resignation, to fill the job (Dr. Mrs. Suman V. Jain v. Marwadi Sammelan, 2024 INSC 127, decided 20 February 2024, paragraphs 26 to 28).

After the resignation has become effective. Only the statutory route survives, and it is narrow. Rule 26(5) of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021 allows the appointing authority to permit withdrawal in the public interest on four cumulative conditions: the resignation was tendered for compelling reasons involving no reflection on integrity, efficiency or conduct, and the withdrawal request results from a material change in the circumstances that originally compelled it; the conduct of the person in the intervening period was in no way improper; the period of absence from duty between the effective date and the date of the application to withdraw is not more than ninety days; and the post vacated, or another comparable post, is available.

Rule 26(6) then imposes an absolute bar. Withdrawal shall not be accepted where the servant resigned with a view to taking up an appointment in or under a private commercial company, or in or under a corporation or company wholly or substantially owned or controlled by the Government, or in or under a body controlled or financed by the Government. There is no public-interest override on this one.

Even a permitted withdrawal does not restore the lost time. The order is deemed to include condonation of the interruption in service, but the period of interruption does not count as qualifying service (Rule 26(7)).

The 90 days is treated as close to sacrosanct. Relaxation under the power-to-relax provision, Rule 86 of the 2021 Rules and Rule 88 of the 1972 Rules, will be entertained only in exceptional cases properly justified from the point of public interest by the administrative department concerned, and even then only if the time limit is exceeded very marginally; ministries were advised to avoid sending such proposals at all (paragraphs 2 and 3, DoPT OM No. 28035/2/2007-Estt.(A) dated 4 December 2007).

For employees covered by the National Pension System the equivalent provisions are now statutory. Rules 14(3) to 14(5) of the CCS (Implementation of National Pension System) Rules, 2021, notified as G.S.R. 227(E) dated 31 March 2021, carry the same conditions, with the temporary-servant bar written in as condition (a), that the person was not a temporary government servant at the time his resignation was accepted. DoPT OM No. 28035/2/2014-Estt.(A) dated 10 June 2019, which supplied executive guidelines “till the time the statutory rules regarding withdrawal of resignation for such Government servants are notified”, is spent to the extent the 2021 Rules cover the same ground, though departmental circulars still cite it as live.

Pension, gratuity and the compassionate allowance

Nothing is payable under any of the three heads, and the reasoning differs slightly for each.

Pension fails at the threshold. Forfeiture under Rule 26(1) removes the qualifying service on which a pension claim would rest, so there is no computation to perform and no minimum-service argument to make. Completing 20 or 30 years changes nothing, because those thresholds belong to Rule 43(1) and Rule 42 and are engaged only by a person who invokes them.

Retirement gratuity fails on two independent limbs. Rule 45(1)(a) of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021 grants it to a servant who has completed five years of qualifying service and has become eligible for service gratuity or pension under Rule 44 on his retirement. A resignation forfeits the qualifying service and is not a retirement, so neither limb is satisfied. The ceiling in the rule as notified was Rs. 20 lakh, raised to Rs. 25 lakh with effect from 1 January 2024 by the DoPPW OM dated 30 May 2024, but the ceiling is irrelevant to a person who is outside the rule.

For employees under the National Pension System the position was spelt out only recently, and in terms. Resignation, except a technical resignation or a deemed retirement or absorption, forfeits past service and no gratuity is payable in such cases (DoPPW OM No. 2/8/2025-P&PW(F)/11164 dated 24 October 2025, reading the CCS (Payment of Gratuity under National Pension System) Rules, 2021, G.S.R. 658(E) dated 23 September 2021).

The compassionate allowance is the provision people most often expect to rescue them, and it does not reach this case. Rule 41 permits an allowance of up to two-thirds of the pension that would otherwise have been admissible, but the proviso is confined to a government servant who is dismissed or removed from service. A person who resigns is outside it, which produces the counter-intuitive result that dismissal can leave a person better off than resignation.

Why the Payment of Gratuity Act does not rescue the position

The 2025 Supreme Court decision in Ashok Kumar Dabas did award gratuity, and that part of it is regularly quoted out of context by people applying it to central government service. It does not carry across.

Gratuity was awarded there under Section 4 of the Payment of Gratuity Act, 1972, because the Delhi Transport Corporation is a corporation and had no exemption notification under Section 5 of that Act. The award turned on the employer’s character, not on the employee’s.

Section 2(e) of the same Act closes the door for central government servants. The definition of “employee” excludes any such person who holds a post under the Central Government or a State Government and is governed by any other Act or by any rules providing for payment of gratuity, a substitution made by Act 47 of 2009 with retrospective effect from 3 April 1997. A servant governed by the CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021 or by the CCS (Payment of Gratuity under NPS) Rules, 2021 falls squarely inside that exclusion.

Leave encashment

Something is paid here, and it is the one head under which a resigning employee receives a computed cash benefit rather than a refund of his own money. The scale is half of what a retiring employee gets.

Where a government servant resigns or quits service, he may be granted, suo motu, by the authority competent to grant leave, cash equivalent in respect of earned leave at his credit on the date of cessation of service, to the extent of half of such leave at his credit, subject to a maximum of 150 days (Rule 39(6)(a)(ii), CCS (Leave) Rules, 1972, inserted by DoPT Notification No. 14028/9/80-Estt.(L) dated 1 October 1981, the ceiling having been raised from 120 days to 150 days by Notification No. 13026/1/99-Estt.(L) dated 18 April 2002).

Two limits inside that sentence do the work. The entitlement is half the leave at credit, not the whole of it, and the 150-day figure is a cap on the result rather than an entitlement in itself. An employee with 200 days of earned leave at credit is paid for 100 days; an employee with 400 days at credit is paid for 150, not 200.

Half pay leave is not encashable on resignation at all. The 300-day ceiling and the half-pay-leave component belong to retirement under Rule 39(2) and to the retirement-by-notice and termination cases in Rules 39(5) and 39(6)(a)(i).

The computation is the same one used at retirement. Cash equivalent is pay plus dearness allowance admissible on the date of cessation, divided by 30, multiplied by the number of days (Rule 39(2)(b)(i)). The leave encashment article works through the arithmetic.

The baseline rule explains why any of this needs an express provision. Any claim to leave to the credit of a government servant who is dismissed, removed, or resigns ceases from the date of the dismissal, removal or resignation, except as provided in Rule 39 (Rule 9(1), CCS (Leave) Rules, 1972). On a technical resignation the leave does not lapse at all, under Rule 9(2), and on permanent absorption in a public sector undertaking, autonomous body or State Government the servant receives cash equivalent for earned leave and half pay leave together up to 300 days under Rule 39-D.

Provident fund and pension-scheme corpus

The treatment splits three ways depending on when the employee joined and which scheme applies, and the outcomes differ sharply.

General Provident Fund. The balance is paid out in full. When a subscriber quits the service, the amount standing to his credit in the Fund becomes payable to him (Rule 31, GPF (Central Services) Rules, 1960), with the manner of payment governed by Rule 34. Forfeiture of qualifying service is irrelevant here because the fund carries no government contribution at all: the balance is the subscriber’s own subscriptions plus interest. On a technical resignation the balance is transferred rather than paid out, under Rule 35.

National Pension System. Rule 14(1) of the CCS (Implementation of National Pension System) Rules, 2021 provides that on resignation, unless it is allowed to be withdrawn in the public interest, the lump sum and the annuity out of the subscriber’s accumulated pension corpus are paid in accordance with the PFRDA regulations applicable to exit before superannuation. The first proviso bars any payment before the expiry of 90 days from the date the resignation becomes effective and the subscriber is relieved of duty; the second releases payment immediately to the person eligible if the subscriber dies inside those 90 days; and the third allows the subscriber to keep the same Permanent Retirement Account Number and continue as a non-government subscriber instead of exiting.

The exit terms themselves sit in the PFRDA regulations. For a government-sector subscriber who exits before superannuation on resignation, at least 80% of the accumulated pension wealth must mandatorily be used to purchase an annuity and the balance is paid in a lump sum (Regulation 3(b), PFRDA (Exits and Withdrawals under the National Pension System) Regulations, 2015, as amended by the Amendment Regulations dated 12 December 2025, gazetted 16 December 2025). Where the accumulated pension wealth is Rs. 5,00,000 or less, the subscriber may withdraw the entire amount without purchasing an annuity, on which the right to any pension under the scheme extinguishes; that threshold was raised from Rs. 2,50,000 by the amendment regulations dated 12 December 2025, having itself been raised from Rs. 1 lakh in June 2021. Where the corpus exceeds Rs. 5,00,000 but the subscriber is below the minimum annuity-purchase age, the subscriber continues in the scheme until reaching it. The NPS exit rules set out the full mechanics.

The employer’s share is not clawed back, and this is the largest single difference between the two pension regimes on resignation. The whole accumulated pension wealth in the account, including the government’s contribution of 14% of basic pay plus dearness allowance and the returns earned on it, is what is annuitised and paid out. Neither Rule 14 nor Regulation 3(b) provides for recovery. A pre-2004 employee who resigns loses the pension entirely; a post-2003 employee who resigns walks away with the government’s money in his account.

Unified Pension Scheme. The assured payout is forfeited. The assured payout shall not be available in case of removal or dismissal from service or resignation of the employee, and in such cases the Unified Pension Scheme option shall not apply (paragraph 2(ii), Ministry of Finance notification F. No. FX-1/3/2024-PR dated 24 January 2025), a position restated at Regulation 13(2) of the PFRDA (Operationalisation of the Unified Pension Scheme under National Pension System) Regulations, 2025 notified on 19 March 2025. Regulation 13(1) lists the only three qualifying exits: superannuation after 10 years of qualifying service, retirement under FR 56(j), and voluntary retirement after 25 years of qualifying service, payable from the notional superannuation date.

What the resigning subscriber actually receives was settled a year later. Rule 15 of the CCS (Implementation of the Unified Pension Scheme under the National Pension System) Rules, 2025, notified as G.S.R. 599(E) dated 2 September 2025 and circulated by DoPPW OM No. 57/03/2022-P&PW(B)/8361(3) dated 29 October 2025, provides that resignation forfeits the assured payout and that the accumulated pension wealth in the individual corpus is payable to the subscriber as a lump sum, not released before 90 days from the effective date and relief, and payable to the legally wedded spouse or failing that the legal heirs if the subscriber dies inside those 90 days. The pool corpus, funded by the additional government contribution of 8.5% of basic pay plus dearness allowance under the January 2025 notification, is not payable.

The comparison is worth stating plainly, because it runs against intuition. A resigning Unified Pension Scheme subscriber receives the individual corpus as a full lump sum, while a resigning plain National Pension System subscriber must annuitise at least 80% of a comparable corpus. On this one narrow point the scheme built around an assured pension is the more liquid of the two.

Medical cover, travel concession, accommodation and dues

CGHS cover ends with service. Every card application carries an undertaking to surrender the card on transfer, retirement, termination, resignation, or on ceasing to be eligible, under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare OM F. No. S.11012/1/2024-EHS dated 28 June 2024. Continued cover afterwards runs entirely through pensioner status, since a pensioner card is issued to pensioners and family pensioners drawing pension from the Central Civil Estimates, and a person who resigns draws no pension. The CGHS contribution and ward entitlement article sets out the categories.

Leave Travel Concession entitlement is carried forward only on a technical resignation, and even then with a condition. A servant who resigns within eight years of appointment and joins another government post after a technical resignation is treated as a fresh recruit for eight years from the date of initial appointment, under paragraph 2.3 of the DoPT instructions dated 24 November 2022. An ordinary resignation ends the entitlement with the service.

Government accommodation is treated unfavourably by design. Under the Central Government General Pool Residential Accommodation Rules, 2017, resignation, dismissal, removal, termination of service and unauthorised absence without permission form a single category with its own short retention period, and resignation is a disqualifying event for the concessional retention that retirees receive. Technical resignation is carved out, with retention at par with transfer where the allottee technically resigns on appointment to an ineligible office. Recovery of dues relating to accommodation runs through Rules 68 and 69 of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021 and the No Demand Certificate machinery in Rule 55.

Deemed relinquishment after five years of absence

A government servant who simply stops attending does not remain on the rolls indefinitely, and the mechanism that ends the relationship is a deemed resignation rather than a penalty.

A government servant absent from duty for a continuous period exceeding five years other than on foreign service, with or without leave, shall be deemed to have resigned from government service, unless the President otherwise determines (Rule 12(2), CCS (Leave) Rules, 1972, as substituted by DoPT Notification No. 13026/2/2010-Estt.(L) dated 29 March 2012). The consequence is the ordinary consequence of a resignation, including forfeiture under Rule 26(1).

Two safeguards limit it. The rule operates only after a reasonable opportunity to explain has been given, and a proviso added by Notification No. 18017/1/2014-Estt.(L) dated 3 April 2018 excludes the case where leave was applied for on a medical certificate in connection with a disability.

Shorter periods of unauthorised absence are handled by different machinery altogether, through dies non treatment or through major or minor penalty proceedings under the CCS (CCA) Rules, 1965, not through this rule.

Probationers and temporary government servants

A temporary servant has an alternative that a permanent servant does not: the Rule 5(1) severance route, which operates on expiry of notice and requires no acceptance. The choice between that route and a resignation matters, because only one of them is subject to the acceptance instructions.

The withdrawal machinery, by contrast, is closed to temporary servants entirely. Two independent sources say so: the provision for withdrawal of resignation shall not be applicable for temporary government servants (paragraph 6, DoPT OM No. 28035/2/2014-Estt.(A) dated 10 June 2019), and the statutory condition that the person concerned was not a temporary government servant at the time of acceptance of his resignation (Rule 14(3)(a), CCS (Implementation of NPS) Rules, 2021).

The 1988 OM reached the same result by reasoning that no longer holds. It said the withdrawal provisions applied only to permanent servants because the CCS (Pension) Rules, 1972 applied only to holders of permanent posts. Rule 2 of the CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021 is not so limited, so the bar now rests on the 2019 OM and the 2021 NPS Rules rather than on the 1988 reasoning.

A temporary servant applying for a post elsewhere is asked as a matter of rule to resign from the parent department at the time of release, on a prior undertaking, and retains no lien. Permanent servants selected by an autonomous body or a central public sector enterprise must resign before they are permitted to join, and no lien is retained there either.

Re-appointment and the bar on condonation

Forfeiture under Rule 26(1) is permanent unless one of three things happened: the resignation fell within Rule 26(2), it was submitted for absorption and so is protected by Rule 26(8), or the appointing authority permitted its withdrawal within the 90-day window under Rule 26(5).

Ordinary condonation of an interruption does not rescue it, and the exclusion is express. Nothing in sub-rule (1) shall apply to interruption caused by resignation, dismissal or removal from service or for participation in a strike (Rule 28(2), CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021), which removes the automatic condonation that Rule 28(1) would otherwise apply to an interruption between two spells of civil service.

A person who resigns and is later appointed afresh starts a new period of qualifying service under Rule 11. Rule 19, which allows pre-retirement civil service to be counted for a re-employed government servant, is confined to re-employed pensioners and gives a former resignee nothing, since he is not a pensioner.

All India Services

The All India Services reach the same destination by a differently drafted route, and the differences matter for an IAS, IPS or Indian Forest Service officer.

No retirement benefits may be granted to a person who has been dismissed or removed from the Service or who has resigned from the Service (Rule 5(1), All India Services (Death-cum-Retirement Benefits) Rules, 1958). The proviso allows the State Government to grant a compassionate allowance of up to two-thirds of the retirement benefits, but only to a person dismissed or removed, so the same asymmetry as under the CCS rules applies here.

Rule 5(2) covers the compelled resignation. Where a member is required to retire or resign as a condition of appointment under a statutory or other body, he receives the retirement benefits he would have had if invalidated. This is subject to Rule 5A on permanent absorption in a corporation, company or body, under which the member is deemed to have retired from Service from the date of absorption and receives benefits on the terms applicable to Central Civil Services Group A officers, a provision inserted by Notification No. 25011/22/82-AIS(II) dated 16 July 1983.

Withdrawal of an All India Services resignation carries a bar that has no CCS equivalent. It is not available where the member resigned to be associated with a political party or an organisation taking part in politics, to take part in or assist a political movement or activity, or to canvass or interfere in an election, a restriction inserted by Notification No. 25011/46/76-AIS(II) dated 28 March 1978.

Deemed resignation for absence works identically but with a different determining authority. Rule 7(2) of the All India Services (Leave) Rules, 1955 deems a member absent for a continuous period exceeding five years to have resigned, unless the Central Government otherwise determines, where the CCS rule reserves that determination to the President.

Points on which published guidance is commonly wrong

Eight claims appear across aggregator sites, coaching material and departmental circulars without support in any primary instrument.

“A permanent government servant must give three months’ notice.” No CCS rule prescribes any notice period for resignation by a permanent servant. Three months appears in Rule 43(1) on voluntary retirement, in Rule 42(2) on premature retirement, and in bank and public-sector service regulations, none of which govern a resignation.

“The notice period can be bought out by paying pay in lieu.” The pay-in-lieu provision in the proviso to Rule 5(1)(b) of the CCS (Temporary Service) Rules, 1965 compensates the servant when the employer terminates forthwith. It runs in the opposite direction from the way it is usually quoted, and no provision permits a servant to pay his way out of notice.

“A resignation is deemed accepted if it is not decided within 30 or 90 days.” No deeming provision exists anywhere in the CCS or All India Services framework. The two 90-day periods that do exist, the withdrawal cap in Rule 26(5)(iii) and the payment freeze on the NPS and UPS corpus, are unrelated to each other and neither concerns acceptance.

“A resignation cannot be accepted during suspension.” The 1988 OM says it would not be correct to accept one normally, and then sets out three express exceptions. It is a presumption that a competent authority can displace on recorded reasons, not a bar.

“The premature-exit threshold for a full withdrawal is Rs. 2,50,000.” That was the position until the PFRDA (Exits and Withdrawals under the NPS) (Amendment) Regulations, 2025, dated 12 December 2025 and published in the Gazette on 16 December 2025, raised it to Rs. 5,00,000 for a government-sector subscriber. The threshold at normal exit on superannuation rose in the same amendment, from Rs. 5 lakh to Rs. 8 lakh, so the two figures are Rs. 5 lakh on premature exit and Rs. 8 lakh at superannuation, not the other way round.

“DoPT OM dated 10 June 2019 governs withdrawal of resignation for NPS employees.” That OM applied by its own terms only until the statutory rules were notified. Rules 14(3) to 14(5) of the CCS (Implementation of NPS) Rules, 2021 are those rules, and they have been in force since 31 March 2021.

“Rule 26(4) sets the withdrawal conditions.” That is the 1972 numbering. In the CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021 the withdrawal conditions are at Rule 26(5) and the private-sector bar at Rule 26(6), while Rule 26(4) now deals with an interruption caused by the two posts being at different stations.

“A resignation with a long service record can be converted into voluntary retirement.” It cannot, either administratively or by a court. That was the precise argument rejected in Ashok Kumar Dabas v. Delhi Transport Corporation, 2025 INSC 1404, decided 9 December 2025.

One further inconsistency sits inside a current instrument rather than in secondary writing. Paragraph 2.7 of the DoPT instructions dated 24 November 2022 relies on “Rule 26(2) of CCS (Pension) Rules 1972”, eleven months after the 1972 Rules were replaced by the CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021 notified on 20 December 2021. The substance is unaffected, because the 2021 Rules kept the same rule and sub-rule number, but the citation is to a repealed instrument.

Related Articles

• Technical resignation
• Voluntary retirement
• Premature retirement
• Retirement age in central government service
• Superannuation
• Dismissal and removal from service
• Discharge from service
• Compassionate allowance
• Qualifying service
• CCS (Pension) Rules 2021
• Central government pension
• Retiring pension
• Service gratuity
• Gratuity in central government service
• Gratuity under the NPS Rules 2021
• Death gratuity
• Leave encashment
• Earned leave
• Half pay leave
• CCS (Leave) Rules
• Extraordinary leave
• General Provident Fund
• National Pension System
• NPS exit rules
• Old Pension Scheme
• Unified Pension Scheme
• NPS, OPS and UPS compared
• Suspension
• Departmental inquiry
• Major and minor penalty proceedings
• CCS (CCA) Rules
• CCS (Conduct) Rules
• Vigilance clearance
• Probation in central government service
• Confirmation in service
• CCS (Temporary Service) Rules
• Appointing authority
• Lien
• Joining time
• Seniority
• Deputation in central government
• Permanent absorption
• Central autonomous bodies
• Re-employment after retirement
• Last pay certificate
• No Demand Certificate
• Government accommodation
• Directorate of Estates
• Service book
• Dies non
• CGHS contribution and ward entitlement
• Leave Travel Concession
• All India Services
• Central Administrative Tribunal
• Appeal, review and revision under the CCS (CCA) Rules
• Department of Personnel and Training
• Central government employees

External references

• Department of Personnel and Training, establishment OMs and instructions
• Department of Pension and Pensioners’ Welfare, CCS (Pension) Rules and circulars
• Pensioners’ Portal, rules and orders
• Pension Fund Regulatory and Development Authority, exit regulations
• NPS Trust, exit and withdrawal
• Gazette of India, notifications
• Central Government Health Scheme

References

1. Rule 26 (forfeiture of service on resignation), Rules 5(2), 11, 16, 19, 24, 28, 35, 36, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 55, 67, 68, 69 and 86, CCS (Pension) Rules, 2021 (notified 20 December 2021).
2. DoPT Office Memorandum No. 28034/25/87-Estt.(A) dated 11 February 1988 (consolidated instructions on resignation).
3. DoPT Office Memorandum No. 28034/4/94-Estt.(A) dated 31 May 1994 (mandatory vigilance clearance before acceptance).
4. DoPT Office Memorandum No. 28035/2/2007-Estt.(A) dated 4 December 2007 (relaxation of the 90-day withdrawal limit).
5. DoPT Office Memorandum No. 28035/2/2014-Estt.(A) dated 10 June 2019 (withdrawal of resignation, National Pension System employees).
6. Rule 5(1), CCS (Temporary Service) Rules, 1965; Rules 9, 12(2), 39(2), 39(6), 39-D, CCS (Leave) Rules, 1972; Rules 31, 34 and 35, General Provident Fund (Central Services) Rules, 1960.
7. Rule 14, CCS (Implementation of National Pension System) Rules, 2021, G.S.R. 227(E) dated 31 March 2021; CCS (Payment of Gratuity under National Pension System) Rules, 2021, G.S.R. 658(E) dated 23 September 2021.
8. Regulations 3(a) and 3(b), PFRDA (Exits and Withdrawals under the National Pension System) Regulations, 2015, as amended by the Amendment Regulations dated 12 December 2025, gazetted 16 December 2025.
9. Ministry of Finance notification F. No. FX-1/3/2024-PR dated 24 January 2025; PFRDA (Operationalisation of the Unified Pension Scheme under National Pension System) Regulations, 2025, notified 19 March 2025; Rule 15, CCS (Implementation of the Unified Pension Scheme under the National Pension System) Rules, 2025, G.S.R. 599(E) dated 2 September 2025, circulated by DoPPW OM No. 57/03/2022-P&PW(B)/8361(3) dated 29 October 2025.
10. Union of India v. Gopal Chandra Misra, (1978) 2 SCC 301; Punjab National Bank v. P.K. Mittal, 1989 Supp (2) SCC 175; Moti Ram v. Param Dev, (1993) 2 SCC 725; Shambhu Murari Sinha v. Project and Development India Ltd., (2002) 3 SCC 437; Srikantha S.M. v. Bharath Earth Movers Ltd., decided 7 October 2005; Union of India v. Braj Nandan Singh, (2005) 8 SCC 325; Dr. Mrs. Suman V. Jain v. Marwadi Sammelan, 2024 INSC 127; Ashok Kumar Dabas v. Delhi Transport Corporation, 2025 INSC 1404.