Summary
The Supreme Court rejected ex-Navy Direct Entry Artificers’ claim to count a notional Fleet Reserve period toward pension. Liability to serve in reserve did not automatically enrol them; an express act of drafting was required and none had occurred. Promissory estoppel and parity with Apprentice Entry Artificers did not cure the shortfall in qualifying service. The Court nevertheless directed consideration of special pension on the terms laid down in T.S. Das, subject to eligibility.
Issues
- Whether reserve liability at recruitment automatically constituted Fleet Reserve enrolment for pension.
- Whether promissory estoppel or parity with Apprentice Entry Artificers entitled the appellants to pension.
- Whether their cases required consideration for special pension.
Provisions considered
- Regulation 78, Navy (Pension) Regulations, 1964The ordinary minimum qualifying service was fifteen years. The appellants’ ten years of actual service could not be augmented by a reserve period in which they had never been enrolled. (¶¶ 15, 19, 20, 28)
- Regulation 6, Regulations for the Indian Fleet ReserveJoining Fleet Reserve was not a matter of right. Liability to serve if required was distinct from actual enrolment by the competent authority. (¶¶ 18, 21, 22, 24, 25)
- Section 184A, Navy Act, 1957The protection against prejudicial retrospective regulations did not confer an accrued right to reserve enrolment. The Court followed T.S. Das in rejecting the retrospective-prejudice objection to discontinuance of the reserve establishment. (¶¶ 14, 26)
Held
- Completion of ten years’ naval service did not automatically draft a sailor into Fleet Reserve. An affirmative act of enrolment was necessary, based on qualifications and recommendation, with a reserve certificate. No such enrolment existed for these appellants. (¶¶ 21, 22, 23)
- No assurance of automatic reserve enrolment had been given at recruitment. The conditional service liability therefore supplied no promise on which to invoke promissory estoppel, even apart from the 1976 policy discontinuing reserve transfers. (¶¶ 24, 25, 26)
- The appellants could not count fifty per cent of an unserved reserve period and were not entitled to reservist pension. The controlling principle was the same as in the three-Judge decision in T.S. Das. (¶¶ 24, 25, 28)
- Apprentice Entry Artificers’ qualifying service included four years of naval training under Anuj Kumar Dey. Direct Entry Artificers had no corresponding training period. Membership of the Artificer class did not confer pension after only ten years’ qualifying service or require revisiting the established training-credit ruling. (¶¶ 29, 30)
- The appellants’ cases must nevertheless be considered for special pension on the same lines as paragraph 36 of T.S. Das, subject to its eligibility conditions. Those terms included consideration within three months, pension from three years before the respective application, adjustment of gratuity and DCRG against arrears, and nine per cent interest on arrears until payment. This was a direction to consider eligibility, not an unconditional pension award. (¶¶ 27, 28, 31)
Result
Appeal dismissed insofar as reservist pension was claimed. The appellants’ cases to be considered for special pension on the terms of T.S. Das paragraph 36. No order as to costs.