Key Points
New Delhi: Two Hubli-based educators have secured a win in the Karnataka High Court, which has struck down a provision in the 1943 Ordinance that provided for 100 percent reservation for women in Military Nursing Services...
Peerapur and Shivappa Maranabasari, along with the Karnataka Nurses Association, challenging the validity of Section 6 of the Indian Military Nursing Services Ordinance...
However, the court noted that this condition doesnt exist anymore, and observed: Though, it is urged that the exclusive reservation for women is also provided to encourage women to join the services under the Armed Forces as the women in those days were reluctant to join the Armed Forces, the emergency that was prevailing then in 1943 is no longer there...
The court also asserted that if the requirement is to ensure that enough women nursing officers are available to deploy them on duty in hospitals to make up for the temporary vacancies arising in a war situation where male officers will be deployed on the battlefield, the correct course of action would be to make a law for women in such a way that it does not violate guarantee under Article 16(2)...
For example, while recruiting employees in girls or ladies hostels, or any institution exclusively meant for women, exclusive reservations in favour of women may be justified, it said, adding that no such justification was provided in this case.. It is not the defence that the nursing officers appointed under the 1943 Ordinance are required to discharge the duty in a hospital exclusively meant for women, or that the nature of work is such that it can be done by only women and not by men, the high court observed.. (Edited by Uttara Ramaswamy)..
