Breaking: Discrimination in pension of High Court judges, SC refers matter to larger Bench

One rank, one pension – that was how the petitioner Justice M Vijayaraghavan’s case was summed up by Senior Advocate S Nagamuthu in a challenge to the amendments to High Court Judges (Salaries and Conditions of Service), Act 1954..Justice Vijayaraghavan, a former Madras High Court judge, had moved the Supreme Court challenging the discrimination in pension of High Court judges drawn from the Bar and from subordinate judiciary..12 years is the minimum service required for being eligible for full pension..For High Court judges drawn from the Bar, practice at the Bar is added to the time served at the High Court as a judge, to calculate the eligibilty of pension..However, the same is not done for judges drawn from subordinate judiciary. For judges drawn from subordinate judiciary, the time spent at High Court is, in fact added to their service in the subordinate judiciary and pension is paid on the subordinate judiciary scale. The result is that such High Court judges get a much lesser pension if they have not served in High Court for 12 years, which is the minimum period for being eligible for full pension..Vijayaraghavan J. had, therefore, prayed that the provisions in Chapter III and Part I and Part- III of 1st Schedule of the High Court Judges (Salaries and Conditions of Service) Act, 1954, relating to pensions payable, be struck down as null and void..He had also prayed that a direction be issued to the Centre and State of Tamil Nadu to evolve a formula to obviate the disparities in the pension payable to Judges drawn from Subordinate Judiciary and the Judges drawn from the Bar in tune with “One Rank One Pension” norm laid down by the Supreme Court in P Ramakrishnam Raju v. Union of India..Arguing before a Bench of Justices Jasti Chelameswar and Sanjay Kishan Kaul, Senior Advocate Nagamuthu today said,.“If I serve for 15 years as District Judge and 2 years at the High Court, my two years is added to the 15 in subordinate judiciary. So I get pension based on 17 years at subordinate judiciary. .However, in case of an advocate appointed to High Court after ten years of practice, if he serves for two years at the High Court he is entitled to full pension”..Nagamuthu cited the case of P Ramakrishnan Raju v. Union of India to buttress his case..The Bench had a lengthy discussion at the end of which it told the parties that it is “uncomfortable” with certain observations in Ramakrishnam Raju case..It, therefore, ordered that the matter should be heard by a larger Bench..“We are of the view that considering the importance of the matter and observations in the judgment of P Ramakrishnam Raju v. Union of India, it is appropriate that the matter be dealt with by a larger Bench.”. Read the petition below.