New Delhi: The Indian Coast Guard (ICG) has told the Supreme Court that the present recruitment rules related to short service commission (SSC) officers specifically provide that they cannot seek permanent commission.
The ICG has filed an affidavit in response to a petition moved by a woman officer seeking permanent commission.
"Even in the short service appointment (SSA) batch men and women officers are being released after 14 years as per the terms and conditions of the appointments and respective recruitment rules. Such exercising of belated options was not provided to SSA CPL men and women both," said the affidavit filed by ICG Deputy Inspector General Raj Kamal Sinha.
"The men/women applicant opts for the particular scheme of entry at the time of recruitment and post selection officially accepts the same. The petitioner has opted for short service scheme and applied for the same and after selection she was issued an appointment letter very clearly mentioning about her short service appointment," added the affidavit.
The ICG stressed that it is committed to incrementally inducting more women officers and its recruitment is gender neutral without bias and options are exercised by the candidate whether male and female as per their choice and same is according to principles of natural justice and not gender bias.
"The policy decision of SSA (women) and SSA CPL (male and female) not having an option for change over to permanent entry scheme is also gender neutral," it added.
Earlier, the Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud, observing that women cannot be left out, had asked the Centre to ensure that they are granted permanent commission in the Coast Guard.
"It is submitted that the said Recruitment Rules (of ICG) specifically stipulated that women officers shall not have the option to change over to permanent entry scheme in the future, and the same was also mentioned in the appointment letter issued to the selected candidates, including the petitioner in the present case," said the ICG's affidavit.
It added that the ICG is primarily a sea going service with 66 per cent billets sanctioned for manning afloat units and only 33 per cent billets sanctioned for manning shore support units.
"Due to limited availability of shore billets, a Coast Guard officer has prolonged sea tenure during his career and hence, only 10 per cent appointments were considered for women officers for permanent entry, as at that time it was considered that the ships were not designed to factor in separate accommodation or facilities for entry of women", it added.
The ICG said that for the purpose of enlarging the strength of their entry several operational measures are required to be undertaken, and without putting into effect such operational measures, provision for a greater number of women officers will not be feasible.
The ICG said its charter demands conduct of operations which include anti-piracy, anti-smuggling operations and other law enforcement duties at sea and thus, the working conditions are required to be made conducive for women officers to work onboard ships before further permanent entry is provided for.
The apex court was hearing a plea filed by ICG officer Priyanka Tyagi, represented by senior advocate Archana Pathak Dave, seeking permanent commission for eligible women SSC officers of the force.
In a previous hearing, Attorney General R Venkataramani had said that there were some functional and operational difficulties in granting permanent commission to Short Service Commission (SSC) officers in the Coast Guard.
"You speak of 'nari shakti' (woman power). Now show it here. You are in the deep end of the sea in this matter. You must come up with a policy which treats women fairly," the bench had said.
