Retired judges to be entitled to uniform pension, says SC

Hindustan Times

20-05-2025

The Supreme Court on Monday held that retired high court judges will be entitled to uniform pension and other terminal benefits, ending ambiguity that prevailed over the issue with the government drawing 'artificial' distinctions between permanent and additional judges, which the court held to be violative of the right to equality under the Constitution.
Fixing a uniform scale of pension for any retiring judge or chief justice of the high court, a bench led by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Bhushan R Gavai noticed that the High Court Judges (Salaries and Conditions of Service) Act, 1954 or HCJ Act provides a maximum ceiling of ₹15 lakh per annum as the pension for a retiring chief justice of a high court and ₹13.5 lakh for a retiring high court judge.
Applying this across the board for all retired high court judges, the bench, also comprising justices AG Masih and K Vinod Chandran, said, 'We are, therefore, of the considered view that all retired Judges would be entitled to a pension calculated on the basic pension of ₹13,50,000 per annum as provided under Paragraph 2 of Part I and Paragraph 2 of Part III of the First Schedule to the HCJ Act. In our considered view, only such an interpretation would remove any arbitrariness, inequality and discrimination and bring in parity in the matter of pension payable to all the retired judges.'
It directed the Centre to pay this flat pension to all retired HC judges and ₹15 lakh per annum to all retired CJs of high courts.
Although a 2014 decision of the top court in P Ramakrishna Raju case held that judges will be entitled to one rank one pension, the present decision reiterated it saying, 'We direct that the Union of India shall follow the principle of One Rank One Pension to all the retired judges of the high courts irrespective of their source of entry i.e., district judiciary or the bar, and irrespective of number of years that they have served either as a district judge or a high court judge and all of them shall be paid full pension.'
CJI Gavai, who authored the decision said, 'When all the judges of the high courts, when in office, are entitled to the same salary, perks and benefits, any discrimination amongst them on the ground of their source of entry, in our view, would be patently discriminatory and violative of Article 14 of the Constitution of India.'
The court was deciding a suo motu petition on fixation of pension for HC judges where individual petitions by retired judges seeking gratuity, provident fund also came to be decided by the court.
One category of HC judges were aggrieved that when they joined as HC judges from the district judiciary, the new pension scheme (NPS) applied to them under which they contributed a part towards pension while the other part was contributed by the state. This left them at a disadvantage as under the district judiciary, they were governed by the Old Pension Scheme where the state contributed in full.
The court held that all the retired judges, irrespective of the date on which they were appointed would be entitled to receive ₹13,50,000 as basic pension per annum. As regard the amount that judges had contributed under NPS, the court directed the amounts to be refunded along with the accruing dividend while the contribution of the state would go back to the consolidated fund of the state.
A second category of cases the court dealt with related to those who joined a high court from the district court but had a break in service which affected their pension amount. The top court said, 'The Union of India shall pay full pension irrespective of any break in service between the date on which he/she retired as a judge of the district judiciary and the date on which he/she assumed charge as a judge of the high court.'
The pension payable to high court judges elevated from the Bar would be ₹96,525 per annum for each completed year of service, while the full pension of ₹13.5 lakhs per annum would be payable on the completion of 14 years of service. Ten years practice as an advocate was added as qualifying service from April 1, 2004, as per section 14A of the High Court Judges Act, which was enacted following a Supreme Court judgement in P. Ramakrishnam Raju v Vs Union of India (2014).
Judges elevated from the district judiciary will be entitled to full pension on completion of 20 years of service including the service of high court judge, along with a special additional pension of ₹45,016 per annum for each completed year as high court judge.
The court noted a lack of uniformity even with regard to payment of family pension and gratuity to family members of an additional judge, who was not made permanent in the high court. The court noted that the definition of 'judge' under HCJ Act does not distinguish between chief justice, acting CJ, additional Judge and or acting judge of a high court.
'In view of this, we find that, to bring out any artificial discrimination between a permanent judge and an additional judge in the term 'judge' as defined in Section 14 of the HCJ Act would be doing violence to the definition of a 'judge'...We, therefore, have no hesitation in holding that even the retired judges who have retired as additional judges will be entitled to the same amount of basic pension i.e. ₹13,50,000/- per annum.'
Further, applying the same logic, the court directed the Centre to pay gratuity to the widow or family members of a judge of the HC who dies in harness by adding 10 years period to the period of service undergone by the said judge irrespective of whether the judge qualified under section 17A of the HCJ that requires a minimum qualifying service of two years and six months to be entitled for gratuity.
As per the HCJ Act, section 13A provides that the salary of every high court judge (except CJ) shall be ₹2.25 lakh per month, which comes to ₹27 lakh annually. Taking into consideration this figure, the basic amount of pension has been kept at 50% of the said amount, which comes to ₹13.50 lakh.
Section 17A of the Act entitles the family of a judge, on his/her death before or after the retirement, to family pension at the rate of 50% of his salary from the date following the death of the judge. Such a family pension would be paid for a period of 7 years or for a period up to the date on which the judge would have attained the age of 65 years had he/she survived, whichever is earlier. Thereafter, it is reduced to 30%.
The top court said that if the tenure of a judge is linked with the grant of family pension, then a judge who does not complete the requisite period would be denied the full pension. 'In our view, such a situation would lead to an absolute absurdity,' the bench observed.
Even with regard to payment of provident fund, the court clarified that all the allowances payable to a retired judge on his retirement as a judge of the HC, irrespective of the mode of entry as HC judge, will have to be paid in accordance with the provisions of the HCJ Act.