India, Nov. 3 -- The Supreme Court pulled up the Indian Army for showing "disservice" to women permanent commission officers who were denied promotion as Colonels as it found the cut off for considering their confidential reports to be "arbitrary" and directed that a fresh exercise be conducted within a fortnight to reconsider the case of nearly 136 women officers in the race for promotion.

A bench headed by Chief Justice of India (CJI) Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud said, "The cut off was applied arbitrarily in the present case to ostensibly equate the women officers to their male counterparts." The Army and the Union government justified their action by relying on their policy framework and the top court's judgment of March 2021 which laid c...