In a landmark verdict on Tuesday, the Supreme Court ruled that women Short Service Commission (SSC) officers across the Army, Navy, and Air Force, who were previously denied Permanent Commission (PC) due to arbitrary evaluations, are now entitled to full pensionary benefits.
The top court held that the denial of PC to SSC officers in the armed forces stemmed from a flawed and discriminatory evaluation system, particularly in the way their performance was assessed.
The judgment came on a batch of petitions, including those filed by Wing Commander Sucheta Edan and others, challenging the denial of Permanent Commission (PC) based on policy changes in 2019 and previous Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT) rulings.
A bench led by Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justices Ujjal Bhuyan and N Kotiswar Singh held that these officers will be “deemed” to have completed the 20-year minimum service requirement for a pension, regardless of their actual release date.
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While delivering its verdict, the CJI observed that the Annual Confidential Reports (ACRs) of women officers were often assessed “casually”, under the assumption that they would not be eligible for career progression or PC.
“ACRs of appellants were written with the presumption that they will not undergo career progression. Adversely affected overall merit,” the bench noted as per Live Law.
“Model was rational, non-discriminatory and implemented as 1 time measure. Failure of respondents to disclose evaluation criteria etc., has adversely impacted officers,” the bench further said.
The bench separately dealt with the denial of PC to SSC women officers of the Air Force, Navy and Army.
The judgment specifically addressed the Air Force’s 2019 introduction of “Service Length” and “Minimum Performance” criteria. The bench found these rules were implemented so abruptly that officers were denied a fair chance to meet the new standards.
To rectify this, the Court exercised its extraordinary powers under Article 142 of the Constitution, which empowers the top court to pass any orders to do complete justice. The bench sad treating all SSC officers considered for PC between 2019 and 2021, including those released in 2021, will be deemed to have completed 20 years of qualifying service.
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It said the pension will be fixed based on this 20-year deemed service, effective from November 1, 2025.
However, the court declined to order reinstatement, citing “operational effectiveness”, but said that this could not be a ground to deny financial benefits.
Dealing with issues pertaining to the Army and Navy, it found similar flaws in their assessment models and said the failure to disclose evaluation criteria adversely impacted these officers.
The court rejected the plea for notional time-scale promotions to the rank of Wing Commander for those not in active service.
The detailed judgement is awaited.
Earlier, the Centre had defended its policy, saying that the Army’s processes were gender-neutral and that “elimination is part of a policy to keep the forces young.”
(With agency
