Alka Verma –
Published On: October 23, 2021 at 10:30 IST
Thirty-nine women Army officers have got Permanent Commission after the order of the Supreme Court, which asked the Central Government to ensure that their service status is granted within seven working days.
A Bench comprising Justices D. Y. Chandrachud and B. V. Nagarathna observed that out of 72 officers only 39 were given the Permanent Commission and other were denied on various grounds.
The Centre from its end submitted that after the re-examining of all 72 SSC Officers, if was found that while 7 officers are medically unfit, 25 officers can’t be granted permanent commission as they have discipline issues and 1 officer has decided to quit.
Adding to this, the Centre also informed the Court that left 39 officers were considered for the Permanent Commission.
However, the Court ordered the Centre to publish and submit a detail report regarding why the 25 women officers were denied Permanent Commission.
“In other words, once the final judgement and order of this Court has been pronounced, the consideration for the grant of PC has to be confined to the specific directions issued and not be based upon grounds independent of the judgement”, stated the Court.
The Court made these directions while it was hearing a petition filed by 72 women officers who in their Petition claimed that they were denied Permanent Commission.
The women officers in their Petition mentioned that denial of PC has violated the Supreme Court’s judgment wherein the Court ordered that all women officers who have gained the 60% cut-off are entitled to Permanent Commission if cleared medical and disciplinary criteria.
It was also informed that Centre added their own additional merit criteria like “discipline, disobedience of orders, lapses in Government procurement, forging medical documents, poor work ethics, lack of professionalism, un-officer like conduct, poor performance in courses etc.” and denied Permanent Commission on these such criteria.
It should be noted here that on October 8, the Apex Court gave the time to the Centre and the Indian Army till October 22 to solve the issue of Permanent Commission of officers who had cleared all the merit criteria.
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