The Punjab and Haryana High Court in the case Captain Sukhjit Pal Kaur Sanewal (Read.) v. UOI and Ors observed and has issued the notice on the plea moved seeking directions to Union government to use gender inclusive term instead of ‘Ex-service man’ in order to refer the Ex-Service Personnel for the purposes of certain schemes and the benefits of Central Government.
The Division bench comprising of Acting Chief Justice Ritu Bahri and Justice Nidhi Gupta in the case observed and has issued the notice to the Union government and the other authorities in the said matter.
It was contended before the court that even though the terminology which is used in the title of the department that was being created to lay focused attention to the welfare and resettlement of Ex-service personnel is gender-specific i.e. the department of Ex-servicemen Welfare and the same is the case with rules for reservation for ex-service personnel i.e. Ex- servicemen, the Re-employment in Central Civil Services and Posts Rules, 1979.
In the present case, the plea is moved by one retired Short Service Commissioned Officer Captain Sukhjit Pal Kaur Sanewal through Advocate Navdeep Singh wherein seeking the directions to the Central government in order to employ gender- inclusive terminology while referring to the former women members of the defence services instead of ‘Ex-Service man’, that is currently being used by the Union and the other authorities in policies and communications.
The petitioner in the plea also referred to the case Priyanka R Patil v. Kendriya Sainik Board, wherein the Karnataka High Court called for changes in the nomenclature employed to refer to retired army, navy, and air force personnel, suggesting the Union and the State Government to use the term ‘ex-service personnel’ in place of the term ‘ex-servicemen’ in its policy making endeavours.
The petitioner also referred to Handbook on Combating Gender Stereotypes which has been issued by Supreme Court in order to identify and to remove the use of words and phrases, which are being loaded with gender stereotypes, in judgments and the court language.
The plea moved give reference to countries like UK, the USA, New Zealand, Canada, Australia which are already using gender neutral terminology in order to address a person who served in the military.
Accordingly, the court listed the matter for further consideration on January 25, 2023.
The counsel, Advocates Navdeep Singh, Jasneet Kaur, Himani Makkad, Aproova Pushkarna, Akansha Duvedi, Roopan Atwal appeared for the petitioner.