Small dip in military’s legal battles against own soldiers

NEW DELHI: The armed forces’ effort to reduce the number of cases they fight against their own has seen the withdrawal of just around 180 cases of a total of 7,676, a senior government official said on condition of anonymity.

The armed forces were asked to review the cases because the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government doesn’t want them to waste time and resources on litigation, and also believes they should not be engaged in legal battles with their own.

Courts too have taken a dim view of such cases. Earlier this year, the ministry of defence was fined Rs 1 lakh each on two separate occasions by the Supreme Court for unnecessary litigation.

As of November 2018, 7,676 cases had been filed by the services against their people, according to a recent review by the ministry of defence. A review of pending cases carried out by the ministry on June 6 was inconclusive. “No clear or satisfactory position is emerging,” the minutes of the meeting accessed by HT said. Subsequently, the ministry on September 7 said in a communication: “Litigations (should) be viewed in an impersonal, non-adversarial and dispassionate manner and should not be made a prestige-issue or a win/loss situation. The tendency to the continuous unethical filing of appeals in issues that have attended finality at the high court or Supreme Court should be checked and all such pending appeals should be identified and immediately withdrawn.”

It reiterated that “appeals should be an exception and not the rule”. It isn’t clear how many cases were withdrawn last year.

Often, apart from engaging government law officers, the three forces hire lawyers and private firms to litigate matters in the Armed Forces Tribunals

THE ARMED FORCES WERE ASKED TO REVIEW THE CASES BECAUSE THE CENTRE DOESN’T WANT THEM TO WASTE TIME ON LITIGATION

(AFT) and the Supreme Court. These come at a huge expense.

The Indian Army, which accounts for over 6,000 of the 7,676 cases, will be withdrawing the least number– 58. The Navy will withdraw 79 out of 388 cases. These are mostly pending before various benches of AFTs. The Air Force has already withdrawn 13 cases and is the process of withdrawing 22 more cases out of 59 cases pending in the Supreme Court. The IAF is contesting around 1,058 cases in the Armed Forces Tribunals.

“We have decided not to litigate where court orders have given relief to an individual serving or retired soldiers of the IAF. Only when court orders have an impact on policy, an appeal is filed,” a senior IAF official said.

A defence ministry meet earlier this week failed to make much headway on the issue, another official said. The defence minister is likely to review the issue on Saturday again.

The spokesperson of the ministry of defence and the Indian Army, Colonel Aman Anand, did not respond to queries seeking comment.