Lagatar24 Desk
New Delhi, Jan 18: The Supreme Court Tuesday sought a response from the Centre regarding the intake of only 19 women candidates in National Defence Academy (NDA) and other military-run schools and colleges for the year 2022.
A bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and M M Sundresh issued notice to centre after it was informed that 19 women candidates would be admitted in NDA out of a total of 370 seats. The bench asked the Centre to place the figures on record about the total number of candidates including women who have appeared in the NDA examination 2021, for entrance tests for Rashtriya Indian Military College (RIMC) and for Rashtriya Military School (RMS).
The apex court told Additional Solicitor General Aishwarya Bhati, appearing for the Centre, that the government will have to give a explanation of why the figure of 19 women has been fixed for year 2022 as per the notification issued by UPSC.
“The figure is the same as for the 2021 test. Last year, you said that it was due to infrastructure problems that the intake of women will be less. Now, again for the year 2022, you have proposed to take the same number of women candidates. Why have you fixed this figure? You have to explain this. Nineteen seats cannot be for all times to come. It was only an ad hoc measure,” the bench said.
The top court granted the Centre three weeks to file an affidavit, and the parties two weeks to file a response, before setting a date for a new hearing on March 6.
At the outset, senior advocate Chinmoy Pradip Sharma, representing petitioner Kush Kalra, stated that an additional affidavit was filed stating that the NDA exam was held on November 14, 2021, and 8,009 candidates qualified for the Service Selection Board test as well as medical tests, with 1,002 women and 7,007 men.
According to the information contained in the UPSC and government advertisements, the NDA will accept 400 cadets in the current NDA-II 2021 intake.
“Of these, 208 candidates, including 10 women, will go to the Army. The Navy will take in 42 candidates including 3 women, while the IAF will admit 120 candidates, of which 6 will be women. Thus, the total number of women to be inducted into the NDA in June 2022 is 19,” Mr Sharma said.
“in the examination notice dated December 22, 2021 issued by UPSC for the NDA-I 2022 examination to be held on April 10, 2022 (induction on January 2, 2023), out of a total of 400 vacancies the number of vacancies for women is shown as Army – 208 (including 10 for female candidates), Navy 42 (including three for female candidates) and Indian Air Force (Flying – 92 (including two for female candidates), Ground Duties (Tech) – 18 (including two for female candidates) and Ground Duties (Non-Tech) – 10 (including two for female candidates),” he added.
Mr Sharma stated that the number of women applicants to be inducted in January 2023 remains unchanged as evidenced by the reading of the Examination Notice dated December 22, 2021.
Notably last year, the apex court had directed that female aspirants will be allowed to appear in the NDA examination.
