Supreme Court strikes down Army's policy restricting women officers' appointment to Judge Advocate General posts
A Bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and Manmohan said a policy bifurcating candidates on the basis of gender and reserving more posts for men did not meet the standards of law. Section 12 of the Army Act, 1950 grants exception to women and allows them to join branches like the JAG, of which primary objective is to legally advise the Army.
'The Executive cannot restrict numbers and/or make reservation for male officers under the guise of induction by way of policy or administrative instructions,' the Court observed.
A notification providing women only three posts compared to the availability of double the number of vacancies for men would violate the very grain of the fundamental right to equality, the Court noted.
The Court reasoned that the selection criteria and testing parameters for men and women were the same in JAG though they may occupy different posts. Men and women officers did not have different conditions of service, the Court said.
The Court said the Union Government should allocate 50% of the vacancies for women in the JAG branch, noting that no nation can be secured by only one half of its population.
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