On the face of it, the recent Supreme Court ruling that upheld compulsory retirement of two Chhattisgarh government employees for sub-par performance sounds fair. The state should have the power to weed out mediocrity and make public services efficient. But the devil is in the detail. The verdict throws up troubling questions on the principle of natural justice and scope of Executive authority.
The two employees rose up the ranks to be clerks. Their services were regularised in 2015, indicating that, at least up till then, their record had been found adequate. But in 2017, a screening committee found that five employees, including the two petitioners, did not measure up to the expected standards on parameters such as capabilities and integrity. The evidence for such evaluation was not scrutinised afresh on the ground that the court is not an appropriate appellate authority in such matters and its role is confined to ensuring an objective assessment.
The Supreme Court relied on Baikuntha Nath Das (1992) to conclude that not communicating adverse remarks on service records to the petitioners was acceptable because compulsory retirement is neither a punishment nor a stigma, but an exercise aimed at efficiency. For that reason, it held that the Constitution’s Articles 14 (right to equality) and 311(2) (protection of civil servants from arbitrary removal) do not affect this case. It means that the right to be heard does not apply as a principle of natural justice. It clarified that the Constitution does not recognise the concept of negative equality. In other words, if a mistake is made in one employee’s case, another cannot insist that the same course be applied to him. In the same breath, the court cited Nand Kumar Verma (2012) to insist that government action should be based on solid evidence. Since the same yardstick was used to assess all employees, it found the exercise unbiased.
In effect, the government’s word was taken for granted. This gives authorities a scope to exercise individual prejudice. Besides, the premise that compulsory retirement is not a stigma falls flat in the real world. Denial of information on adverse service remarks and refusal to hear those acted against give too much power to governments. On balance, the verdict is not a good precedent for service law.