Supreme Court restores High Courts’ jurisdiction over Armed Forces Tribunal

Tribune News Service

Vijay Mohan

Chandigarh, March 22

A larger bench of the Supreme Court has fully restored the jurisdiction of the High Courts to hear petitions challenging judgments and orders passed by the Armed Forces Tribunal (AFT), which was restricted due to an earlier decision by a division bench of the Apex Court in 2015.

The judgment comes as a big relief to the defence community which had been rendered almost remediless in 2015 wherein the AFT practically became the first and the last court for them, according to legal experts.

Till 2015, most litigants aggrieved by orders of the AFT were challenging them in jurisdictional High Courts of their respective States. However, in2015 the Supreme Court, inthe case titled Union of India Vs Maj Gen Shri Kant Sharma, held that in view of a specific clause of appeal to the Supreme Court provided in the AFT Act, the High Courts, though empowered under the constitution, should not hear challenges to orders of the AFT.

This made defence personnel, pensioners and their families literally remediless since as per the AFT Act, an appeal to the Supreme Court only lies if a “point of law of general public importance” comes into play.

On the other hand, the central government and the defence services started filing multiple appeals before the Supreme Court even in matters allowing minor benefits to defence personnel and pensioners by averring “general public importance” in every such appeal.

Aggrieved, many litigants approached the Apex Court, pointing out that a Seven Judge Constitution Bench of the Supreme Court, in the case of L Chandra Kumar Vs Union of India, had ruled that direct appeals to the Supreme Court made justice unaffordable and inaccessible. They sought that the right to challenge such orders must be provided to the High Courts at par with such rights provided to civilian employees and pensioners who could challenge orders of the Central Administrative Tribunal in the High Court. The matter was then referred to a larger bench.

Taking note of the Constitution Bench decisions in L Chandra Kumar (1997) and Rojer Mathew (2019) cases the Supreme Court’s larger bench comprising Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul, Abhay S Oka and BV Nagarathna overruled the earlier decision in Union of India Vs Maj Gen Shri Kant Sharma and has held that the High Courts would have jurisdiction over judgments of the AFT.

The Bench has remanded back the appeals which will now be heard by High Courts and which were earlier dismissed by various High Courts over lack of jurisdiction due to the decision in Shri Kant Sharma’s case.

The Apex Court has also remanded back to the High Court a direct appeal filed in the Supreme Court by the government in a service related matter.

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