Supreme Court seeks to know if Madhya Pradesh High Court would reconsider its decision to dismiss six women judges
Satya Prakash
New Delhi, February 2
The Supreme Court on Friday sought to know from the Madhya Pradesh High Court if it would reconsider the decision to terminate the services of six women judges for “unsatisfactory” performance.
“Convey our intentions to the high court,” a Bench led by Justice BV Nagarathna – which had taken suo motu cognisance of the matter last month—told the Madhya Pradesh High Court’s counsel.
Taking cognisance of termination of services of six women civil judges by the Madhya Pradesh Government for their alleged unsatisfactory performance, the top court had last month decided to treat an application moved by three of them as a petition. It had also appointed senior advocate Gaurav Agarwal as amicus curiae to assist it in the matter.
Agarwal submitted that three of the former judges had approached the Madhya Pradesh High Court with their complaints, but the matter had not been taken up. Some of the aggrieved officers had also moved the top court but later chose to withdraw their petitions.
The six woman judicial officers were terminated in June 2023 by the state law department after an administrative committee and a Full Court meeting found their performance during the probation period “unsatisfactory”.
In their application before the top court, three former Civil Judges, class-II (Junior Division) from Madhya Pradesh State Judicial Service said their termination happened despite the fact that quantitative assessment of their work could not be done on account of Covid outbreak.
“It is further submitted that the officers along with three other female officers were appointed in Judicial Services in the state of Madhya Pradesh. They are alleged to be terminated from service primarily on account of disposal not being up to the standards set,” an office report uploaded on the court’s website stated.
Despite having an unblemished service record of four years and not having suffered any adverse remarks, she was terminated without following any due process of law, contended one of the affected former judges who sought to be impleaded in the matter. She alleged her termination from service was a violation of her fundamental rights under Articles 14 (right to equality before law) and 21 (right to life and personal liberty) of the Constitution.
Her application that if the period of her maternity as well as child care leave is taken into consideration in the quantitative work assessment, it will cause grave injustice to her, she submitted.
“It is a settled law that maternity and child care leave is a fundamental right of a woman and also the infant, therefore evaluation of the applicant’s performance for the probation period on the basis of the leave taken by her as part of maternity and child care is grossly violative of her fundamental rights,” her application read.
