Ms. Pammi: During maternity leave you need not take PL/EL as Maternity Leave itself is paid leave. If you are seeking leave after the maternity leave is exhausted, sanctioning further leave depends on the exigencies of service. While Maternity Leave is a legal right bestowed on a women employee, PL/EL is always subject to sanction and depends on exigencies of service.
Your employer is not correct in stating that paid leave is not counted for gratuity purposes. As per Payment of Gratuity Act 1972, one is entitled for gratuity after completion of five years of continuous service. The term Continuous service is defined in Section 2A of the Act. It reads as follows:
Continuous service.- For the purposes of this Act,-
(1) an employee shall be said to be in continuous service for a period if he has, for that period, been in uninterrupted service, including service which may be interrupted on account of sickness, accident, leave, absence from duty without leave ...........
So since your service has been uninterrupted from 21st August 2012 to 3rd September 2017, you are fulfilling the minimum eligibility period and is entitled to gratuity. The Act requires that the gratuity is paid within 30 days of your termination of service, beyond that you are entitled to interest also. As it is more than a month, they will have to pay you with interest.
You can try to reason out with the above legal position but if they persist with their wrong interpretation, you can adopt the way suggested by Sainath Sir.