The Indian Air Force has been asked by the Delhi high court to relieve one of its airmen within a week to enable him join the Central Industrial Security Force as an assistant commandant.
A bench of justices Pradeep Nadrajog and Manmohan Singh directed the IAF to give 24-year-old Airman Sandeep Kumar its no-objection certificate to join CISF, saying "the aspiration and the hard work of the youth has to be protected."
The court gave its order on Kumar's plea against the IAF decision to deny him the NOC on the alleged ground that he had applied for the job in CISF without prior approval from IAF.
"The aspirations of the petitioner (Kumar), his hard work and his achievements when weighed in the scale with the interest of the organisation on the other side, compels us to hold the scale in favour of the petitioner.
"And we feel that Kumar deserves a pardon for the wrong committed by him," said the bench, ordering IAF to issue NOC to him.
In his plea, Haryana native Kumar had said he had joined IAF as Airman in 2004 after his schooling, but during his service with it, he had graduated and got through the Union Public Service Commission examination for the post of assistant commandant in the Central Para Military Force in 2010.
"Aspirations of the youth of this country, and especially of those who come from humble origins need to be nurtured and protected, and in our opinion not sacrificed on the altar of punishments," the bench said on Kumar's plea.
"That apart, what purpose would it serve if we hold it against Kumar: he would always have a brooding ill will against the system and would always feel cheated in life of not being permitted to achieve what he could do by dint of his hard-work. He would be a disgruntled Airman and suffice would it be to state that it is better not to have any employee rather than to have a disgruntled employee in the organisation," the bench addded.
The court relied on the Air Force Order 2008 and the guidelines in this regard which said no Air Force personnel would be permitted to apply for a civil post or a post in a Public Sector Undertaking unless he has served for 7 years from the date of enrolment.
"As noted, the petitioner(Kumar) joined the Air Force on January 12, 2004 and would have thus completed 7 years service as on January 12, 2011. Admittedly, he had submitted the application form to UPSC in June 2010, by which date the petitioner had not completed 7 years service," the bench said adding that when Kumar had applied for the NOC he had completed seven year.
