SC junks Army legal wing's male-female ratio, says 50% seats must for women
This story was originally published at 18:20 IST on 11 August 2025
Register to read our real-time news.Informist, Monday, Aug. 11, 2025
NEW DELHI – The Supreme Court Monday set aside the Indian Army's policy to reserve six seats for male candidates as against only three seats for female candidates in the judge advocate general branch as the move was against the concept of equality as enshrined in the Indian Constitution. The apex court also asked the Centre and Indian Army to allocate not less than 50% of the vacancies to women in the Army's legal wing.
"...this court is of the view that the executive cannot restrict their (woman's) numbers and/or make a reservation for male officers under the guise of 'extent of induction' by way of a policy or administrative instruction," said the bench of Justices Dipankar Datta and Manmohan.
The apex court directed the Union of India to, henceforth, conduct recruitment in the manner so as to allocate not less than 50% of the vacancies to women candidates as well as publish a common merit list for all legal wing candidates and make the merit list public as well as the marks obtained by all candidates participating in the selection process.
The practice of fixing a ceiling to recruitment of female candidates has the effect of perpetuating the status quo, which has been historically discriminatory to women candidates, said the apex court. The result of such practice is confinement of women candidates, irrespective of their performance or merit, in their gendered category, thereby being destructive of not just the Constitutional scheme under Articles 15 and 16, but also of the concept of "gender-neutrality" and "merit", said the apex court.
"...this court is of the view that once the Army permits women officers to join any corps, department or branch forming a part of the regular Army, it cannot impose an additional restriction with regard to 'extent of induction' of women officers in the said corps, department or branch--as Section 12 of the Army Act, 1950 does not empower it do so," said the top court. The bench said that the apex court agrees with the view held by many that "no nation can be secure, when half of its population, which was its women force, were held back".
The court said that though men and women candidates during the judges advocate general selection procedure appear before separate boards, yet as the selection criteria and testing parameters of the fifteen officer like qualities are identical, it was of the view that a combined merit list ought to be prepared. The top court said that in the present case, the petitioner Arshnoor Kaur has obtained 447 marks as against 433 marks of one of the male candidates and, hence, the Centre and Army are directed to induct her in the next available training course for being commissioned in the legal wing of Indian Army.
The top court was hearing petitions by Kaur and other female candidates against Indian Army's 2023 notification for its legal wing hiring. The petitioners said that the notification was violative of Articles 14, 15, 16, and 19 of the Constitution. The Centre and Army defended the reservation and said the services in Indian Army cannot be compared with any other services, be it public or private. According to the government and Indian Army, determination of vacancies is based on war time requirements to maintain optimal functional and operational needs and, thus, the same is gender-specific and not "gender-neutral". The respondents stated that the functioning of legal wing cannot be seen in isolation as mere legal advisors to military commanders during peace time. The respondents contended that legal wing officers are combatant personnel, who play an important role in operational preparedness of the Army as they constitute a reserve for mobilisation. End
Reported by Surya Tripathi
Edited by Akul Nishant Akhoury
For users of real-time market data terminals, Informist news is available exclusively on the NSE Cogencis WorkStation.
Cogencis news is now Informist news. This follows the acquisition of Cogencis Information Services Ltd by NSE Data & Analytics Ltd, a 100% subsidiary of the National Stock Exchange of India Ltd. As a part of the transaction, the news department of Cogencis has been sold to Informist Media Pvt Ltd.
Informist Media Tel +91 (11) 4220-1000
Send comments to feedback@informistmedia.com
© Informist Media Pvt. Ltd. 2025. All rights reserved.
To read more please subscribe
Share this Story:
