It is declared that 'any person' mentioned in Section 6 of the Territorial Army Act, 1948 includes both males as well as females.
In a path breaking decision, the Delhi High Court on Friday opened the gates for women to enter the Territorial Army.
“Women are eligible for recruitment and appointment to the Territorial Army under Section 6 of the Indian Territorial Army Act, 1948”.
A bench of Acting Chief Justice Gita Mittal and Justice C Hari Shankar held that the impugned advertisements imposing a blanket bar on appointment of women to both departmental and non-departmental battalions of the Territorial Army without any credible, reasonable or compelling justification for imposing such restrictions.
“The restriction of enrolment of women contained in the impugned advertisements and the claimed policy is neither reasonable nor rational and has to be quashed”
“The impugned advertisements to the extent they exclude women from appointment to the Territorial Army and the claimed policy in this regard are ultra vires of Articles 14, 15, 16 and 19(1)(g) of the Constitution of India and are hereby quashed”
“The impugned advertisements imposing a blanket bar on appointment of women to both departmental and non-departmental battalions of the TA without any credible, reasonable or compelling justification for imposing such restrictions. The restriction of enrolment of women contained in the impugned advertisements and the claimed policy is neither reasonable nor rational and has to be quashed”.
The court’s decision comes on a PIL filed by Kush Kalra against what he called the “institutionalized discrimination”.He had challenged the advertisement calling male candidates only for recruitment in Territorial Army.
The bench held that the prohibition notified in the Advertisements with regard to employment of women is concerned, the same is not supported either by statute or by any policy document placed on record.
The bench observed that a careful evaluation of the military service of women in other jurisdictions has been placed by Mr. Gautam Narayan, amicus curiae manifests that more and more countries have moved away from positions of total prohibition/exclusion of women to permitting recruitment of women even in combat roles in the Armed Forces.
Read the Judgment Here