Blitz Bureau
IN a landmark judgment, the Supreme Court on May 19 declared that all retired high court judges are entitled to equal and full pension, regardless of their date of appointment and the source of entry. The court also held that a permanent judge and an additional judge of the high court stand on the same footing as regards post-retiral benefits. Referring to various precedents, the court observed that “one rank one pension must be the norm in respect of a constitutional office.”
Fixing a uniform scale of pension for any retiring judge or chief justice of the high court, a Bench led by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Bhushan R Gavai noticed that the High Court Judges (Salaries and Conditions of Service) Act, 1954 or HCJ Act provides a maximum ceiling of ₹15 lakh per annum as the pension for a retiring chief justice of a high court and ₹13.5 lakh for a retiring high court judge.
Applying this across the board for all retired high court judges, the Bench, also comprising justices AG Masih and K Vinod Chandran, said, “We are, therefore, of the considered view that all retired Judges would be entitled to a pension calculated on the basic pension of ₹13,50,000 per annum as provided under Paragraph 2 of Part I and Paragraph 2 of Part III of the First Schedule to the HCJ Act. In our considered view, only such an interpretation would remove any arbitrariness, inequality and discrimination and bring in parity in the matter of pension payable to all the retired judges.” It directed the Centre to pay this flat pension to all retired HC judges and ₹15 lakh per annum to all retired CJs of high courts.
Although a 2014 decision of the top court in P Ramakrishna Raju case held that judges will be entitled to one rank one pension, the present decision reiterated it saying, “We direct that the Union of India shall follow the principle of One Rank One Pension to all the retired judges of the high courts irrespective of their source of entry i.e., district judiciary or the bar, and irrespective of number of years that they have served either as a district judge or a high court judge and all of them shall be paid full pension.”
