Stressing that Indian Coast Guard is committed to incrementally inducting more women officers, the maritime force has told the Supreme Court that the present recruitment rules related to short service commission officers specifically provide that they cannot seek permanent commission.

The Indian Coast Guard has filed an affidavit in response to a plea moved by a woman officer seeking permanent commission.

Observing that women cannot be left out, a bench headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud recently asked the Centre to ensure 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 affidavit filed by ICG Deputy Inspector General Raj Kamal Sinha.

The affidavit said, “The Coast Guard is committed to incrementally induct more women officers, however, the Indian Coast Guard is primarily a sea going service with 66% billets sanctioned for manning afloat units and only 33% 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 said.

“For the purpose of enlarging the strength of their entry several operational measures are required to be undertaken. Without putting into effect such operational measure, provision for a greater number of women officers will not be feasible. To go beyond this issue, necessary steps are being contemplated...,” it said.

The ICG charter demands conduct of operations which include anti-piracy, anti-smuggling operations and other law enforcement duties at sea, it said. “Besides this, protection of lives of fishermen and merchant marine, prevention and control of marine pollution and other charter of duties are also executed. Thus the working conditions are required to be made conducive for women officer to work onboard ships before further permanent entry is provided for,” it said.

While seeking the response of the Centre and the maritime force, the top court had said, "All these functionality etc argument does not hold water in the year 2024. Women cannot be left out. If you do not do it, we will do it. So take a look at that." The court made the observations when Attorney General R Venkataramani said that there were some functional and operational difficulties in granting permanent commission to Short Service Commission (SSC) officers in the Coast Guard.

The top court was hearing a plea filed by ICG officer Priyanka Tyagi seeking permanent commission for eligible women SSC officers of the force.

"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 observed then.

The bench said the petitioner was the only SSC woman officer who was opting for permanent commission and asked why her case was not considered.

"Now, the Coast Guard must come up with a policy," the bench said.

It had earlier asked the law officer to go over the judgments granting permanent commission to women officers in the three defence services.

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