39 women officers to be granted permanent commission, Centre tells SC

The Centre on Friday told the Supreme Court that it has cleared 39 women officers after having found them eligible for permanent commission, but it rejected pleas of 25 officers.

Additional Solicitor General Sanjay Jain and senior advocate R Balasubramanian, representing the Centre, submitted before a bench presided over by Justice D Y Chandrachud that out of 64 officers, 39 officers have been found to be eligible for the grant of PC upon upon re-consideration of their cases.

The bench, also comprising Justice B V Nagarathna, asked the Centre to scrupulously comply with the statement before November 1.

The government said a comprehensive exercise was carried out once again to re-determine the entitlement of seventy-one Women Short Service Commissioned Officers (WSSCOs).

The officers had secured more than 60% marks and fulfilled all the conditions for the grant of PC, but one officer has applied for release and seven officers were declared medically unfit, it said.

Jain submitted that twenty-five officers were left out, as they were not found to be eligible on disciplinary grounds and, in certain cases, on other issues, such as, integrity or disobedience of lawful orders and operational weak reports.

The bench, however, said that after the exercise of the grant of PC is completed, it would be necessary for the government to apprise the court of the grounds which have resulted in the denial of PC to the remaining officers in the contempt proceedings.

‘If any of the officers forming part of the group of 36 WSSCOs in the present batch of contempt petitions are not found eligible for the grant of PC, a statement shall be tendered before this court in a tabulated form indicating the reasons why each of the officers who are not found eligible are being denied PC,” the bench said in its order.

The court passed its order on a plea by 36 women officers seeking contempt proceedings against army chief and other officers, who had declined them PC, in violation of the top court’s judgment of March, this year.