Delhi High Court seeks Centre’s reply on pleas challenging Agnipath scheme

Last month, the Supreme Court had made the Delhi High Court the core forum to examine the question of the legality of the Agnipath recruitment scheme to the armed forces

The Delhi High Court on August 24 refused to stay the Agnipath scheme for recruitment in the armed forces while hearing a bunch of petitions challenging the scheme.

A Bench of Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Subramonium Prasad asked the Centre to give a consolidated reply on petitions and posted the case for further hearing on October 19.

Also read: Explained | The Agnipath scheme for armed forces

Last month, the Supreme Court had made the Delhi High Court the core forum to examine the question of the legality of the Agnipath recruitment scheme to the armed forces noting that multiple litigation on the Agnipath scheme is “neither desirable nor proper”.

The top court had noted that petitions, either challenging Agnipath or seeking directions to the Centre and the armed forces to complete recruitment process started before the scheme, were pending in various High Courts.

Other than in Delhi High Court, petitions on Agnipath are pending in the High Courts of Kerala, Patna, Punjab and Haryana, Uttarakhand and even in the Armed Forces Tribunal at Kochi.

The apex court had said the other High Courts could either transfer their cases, with the permission of the petitioners, to Delhi or keep those petitions pending there and allow the petitioners to intervene in the proceedings in Delhi. The same course of action could be taken by High Courts in case petitions challenging Agnipath are filed in the future.