Noting that multiple litigation on the Agnipath scheme is "neither desirable nor proper", the Supreme Court on Tuesday made the Delhi High Court the core forum to examine the question of legality of the recruitment scheme to the Armed Forces.
The top court transferred petitions on Agnipath before it to the Delhi High Court. It said the considered view of a High Court in the case was essential. The jurisdiction of the High Courts should not lose significance.
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A Bench led by Justice D.Y. Chandrachud said usually the petitioners would have had to withdraw their cases from the Supreme Court and approach the Delhi High Court on their own. However, this time the Bench went the extra mile to transfer the cases to the Delhi High Court by itself and ensure they get numbered and readied for hearing there.
"We want to avoid delay," the Bench noted.
Similar petitions, either challenging Agnipath or seeking directions to the Centre and the Armed Forces to complete the recruitment processes initiated before the scheme, were pending in various High Courts, it further noted.
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Agnipath cases pending in various HCs
Other than in Delhi High Court, petitions on the scheme are pending in the High Courts of Kerala, Patna, Punjab and Haryana, Uttarakhand and even in the Armed Forces Tribunal at Kochi.
But with the Delhi High Court now the centre of action in the Agnipath litigation, the Superme Court said the other High Courts could either transfer their cases, with the permission of the petitioners, to Delhi or keep those petitions pending there and allow the petitioners to intervene in the proceedings in Delhi. Same course of action could be taken by High Courts if petitions challenging Agnipath were filed in the future.
"We request the Delhi High Court to set down the petitions for expeditious disposal," the Supreme Court urged.
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In one of the earliest pleas, petitioner-advocate M.L. Sharma said the scheme would cause "serious injury" to citizens, the institution of the Armed Forces and the country as a whole.
‘Scheme illegal, unconstitutional’
Mr. Sharma had termed the scheme notification issued by the Ministry of Defence on June 14 as "illegal, unconstitutional and ultra vires" the Constitution.
He had contended that the Armed Forces could not discriminate with a policy which dropped 75% of those inducted after a period of four years' service without even pension.
Another one filed by advocate Harsh Ajay Singh had argued that a mere four-year tenure would not equip young men and women, personally and professionally, to face a competitive world outside the Armed Forces.
Other petitions complained about how ongoing recruitment process to the Armed Forces were derailed with the declaration of the Agnipath scheme. In some cases cases, candidates had successfully completed their tests and were waiting for their appointment letters before Agnipath hit them.
Mr. Sharma had claimed that the protests and violence, which followed the announcement of the scheme, were by a large section of the youth who were staring at a "dark future" and were against seeing soldiering as a "contract job".
