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2026 Supreme(SC) 302

SUPREME COURT OF INDIA
SURYA KANT, CJI., UJJAL BHUYAN, NONGMEIKAPAM KOTISWAR SINGH, J.
Wg. Cdr. Sucheta EDN – Appellant
Versus
Union of India and Others – Respondents
Civil Appeal No. of 2026 (Arising out of Diary No. 28412 of 2024) with Civil Appeal No. of 2026 (Arising out of Special Leave Petition (Civil) No. 16548 of 2024), Civil Appeal No. of 2026 (Arising out of Diary No. 28420 of 2024), Civil Appeal No. of 2026 (Arising out of Diary No. 28428 of 2024), Civil Appeal No. of 2026 (Arising out of Diary No. 28432 of 2024), Civil Appeal No. of 2026 (Arising out of Diary No. 47092 of 2024)
Decided On : 24-03-2026

Advocates appeared:
For the Petitioner(s): Dr. Menka Guruswamy, Sr. Adv. Ms. Garima Sachdeva, Adv. Mr. Hansdeep Singh, Adv. Ms. Shaswati Parhi, Adv. Ms. Divyanshi Maurya, Adv. Mr. Rohit Kumar, AOR Ms. Pooja Dhar, AOR Ms. S. Ambica, Adv. Mr. Atul Kumar, Adv. Mr. Abhimanyu Sharma, Adv. Ms. Deepali Atreja, Adv. Mr. Rahul Thukral, Adv. Mr. Tarun Gupta, AOR Mr. Rakesh Kumar, AOR Mr. Huzefa A Ahmadi, Sr. Adv. Mr. Rahul Krishna, AOR Ms. Rashmi Singh, Adv. Ms. Shruti Sharan, Adv. Mr. Dev Vrat Anand, Adv.
For the Respondent(s): Mrs. Aishwarya Bhati, A.S.G. Ms. Shreya Jain, Adv. Ms. Riddhi Jad, Adv. Mr. Mukesh Kumar Maroria, AOR Mr. Anuj Srinivas Udupa, Adv. Mr. Madhav Singhal, Adv. Mr. Jagdish Chandra, Adv. Mr. Digvijay Dham, Adv. Col Mukul Dev, Adv. Mr. Akshay Bhandari, AOR Mrs. Shriya Gilhotra, Adv. Dr. Menaka Guruswamy, Sr. Adv. Ms. Astha Sharma, AOR Ms. Anju Thomas, Adv. Mr. Sanjeev Kaushik, Adv. Mr. Simranjeet Singh Rekhi, Adv. Ms. Shaswati Parhi, Adv. Ms. Divyanshi Maurya, Adv. Mr. Sanjoy Ghose, Sr. Adv. Mr. Sahil Kalia, Adv. Mr. Chandan Kumar, Adv. Mr. Mohit Garg, Adv. Mr. Siddharth Gill, Adv. Mr. Sahil Chandra, AOR

The court ruled that the abrupt introduction of new performance criteria and the casual grading of ACRs for SSCWOs violated principles of fairness and transparency, impacting their eligibility for Permanent Commission.

Headnote:(A) Armed Forces Act, 1950 - Policy on Permanent Commission for Short Service Commission Women Officers (SSCWOs) - The Court addressed the abrupt introduction of Minimum Performance Criteria for the grant of Permanent Commission under HRP 01/2019, establishing it as arbitrary and unfair due to lack of opportunity for the appellants to meet these criteria. (Paras 35, 36)

(B) Administrative Discretion - The assessment of ACRs for SSCWOs was held to be skewed by the absence of a future career progression context, which impacted their consideration for promotion unfairly. (Paras 9-16)

(C) Gender Equality in Service - The Court examined the policies governing the eligibility of women for Permanent Commission, noting previous judicial interventions that indicated a shift towards equal treatment of male and female officers. (Paras 5.6, 5.10)

(D) Judicial Review - Emphasized that courts may intervene if administrative actions are arbitrary or irrational, particularly in promotional evaluations where fairness and transparency are pivotal. (Paras 8, 24) (E) Final Directions - Appeals allowed; SSCWOs deemed to have completed 20 years of service to receive pension benefits, and new guidelines mandated for future Boards regarding performance criteria and eligibility. (Paras 39, 40)

JUDGMENT :

SURYA KANT, CJI.

Delay condoned. Leave granted.

2. Applications for intervention are allowed, and the Applicants therein are directed to be impleaded as Intervenors.

3. The instant batch of appeals has been instituted by 6 Short Service Commission Women Officers (SSCWOs) in the Indian Air Force, seeking the grant of Permanent Commission (PC) after being denied such relief through successive selection processes. At stake is the manner in which performance, eligibility, and merit were assessed for all Short Service Commission Officers (SSCOs) after years of service on a time-bound commission.

4. The Appellant-SSCWOs approached the Armed Forces Tribunal, Principal Bench at New Delhi (AFT) as well as the High Court of Delhi (High Court), seeking redressal after being denied the grant of PC on three separate occasions. The AFT, vide its judgement dated 26.09.2023, and the High Court, vide its judgement dated 19.02.2024 (Impugned Judgements), dismissed their Original Applications (OAs) and Writ Petition on the ground that the Appellants either failed to meet the Minimum Performance Criteria or that they were placed low in the order of comparative merit.

A. FACTS

5. The catalyst giving rise to these cases is an extended policy embargo on the grant of PC to all SSCOs commissioned after 25.05.2006 in the Air Force. This embargo was lifted suddenly, in the final years of their tenure, so that all the SSCOs commissioned after 25.05.2006 could be afforded an opportunity to compete for PC under a newly-introduced framework. In order to appreciate the issues that fall for our determination, it is necessary to trace the relevant factual and institutional developments leading to the initiation of these appeals.

5.1. The Air Force is broadly organised into two principal branches, i.e. the Flying Branch and the Ground Duty Branch, each comprising multiple specialised streams. As in the Army and the Navy, commissioned service in the Air Force is of two kinds, namely, PC and Short Service Commission (SSC). The SSC Scheme was conceived as a short-term mechanism to induct SSCOs for a limited tenure, primarily to address officer shortages at the junior levels. The first SSC entry was introduced in 1985 only for men in the Technical Ground Duty Branch [Aeronautical Engineering (AE)], followed by the induction of male SSCOs into 6 streams of the Flying Branch in 1990.

5.2. The Government of India decided, in 1992, to open certain branches/streams of the Air Force to women on an experimental basis, in order to “assess their effective utilisation”. Women were accordingly inducted into the Air Force for the first time in 1993, initially for a tenure of 5 years. During this period, male SSCOs were also inducted into additional Ground Duty branches/streams. Under the prevailing induction schemes, such officers were to be considered for the grant of PC upon completion of their initial tenure. Initially, SSCWOs were commissioned only in the Administration, Education, and AE branches/streams, but in subsequent years, SSC entry for women was extended to all streams of the Flying Branch, except for the Fighter stream, which was opened to women only in 2015.

5.3. In 1998, the tenure of SSCWOs was extended by an additional 5 years, thereby deferring their pending consideration for the grant of PC. Prior to 2001, SSC Schemes were governed by differing terms and conditions, depending on the respective branch/stream, resulting in tenure structures such as ‘5 + 6 + 4’ years and ‘6 + 5 + 4’ years.

5.4. Following a comprehensive review of the prevailing SSC Schemes, these disparate schemes were consolidated under a ‘Rationalised SSC Scheme with Uniform Terms and Conditions of Service’ (Rationalised Scheme), which came to be implemented with effect from 23.04.2001. The Rationalised Scheme stipulated a term of ‘10 + 5’ years for SSCOs in both the Flying and Ground Duty Branches. This framework was subsequently amended in 2005 and 2007, whereby the tenure for SSCOs in th