Delhi HC Denies CAPF Retirement Benefit
The Delhi High Court has dismissed a batch of writ petitions and review petitions filed by retired personnel of the Central Armed Police Forces, holding that those who had already crossed 60 years of age before January 31, 2019 are not entitled to enhanced retiral or pensionary benefits arising from the subsequent uniform enhancement of the retirement age to 60 years. The judgment was delivered by a Division Bench of Justice Anil Kshetarpal and Justice Amit Mahajan on April 15, 2026.
The batch comprised W.P.(C) 12501/2019, Charanjit Lal and Ors. v. Union of India and Ors., along with connected matters including Bharat Singh & Ors. v. Union of India & Ors., Ramavatar Sharma and Ors. v. Union of India and Anr., Devender Singh Sangwan and Ors. v. Union of India and Others, Shri N.K.S. Gautam and Others v. Union of India and Others, Ashok Kumar Sharma & Ors. v. Union of India & Anr., Ram Prasad Roy and Others v. Union of India and Others, Ashok Kumar Bhat and Ors. v. Union of India and Ors., Subhash Chowdhury & Ors. v. Union of India & Anr., and K. Sivakumar & Ors. v. Union of India & Anr. The Court noted that all these matters arose from a common grievance concerning entitlement to consequential pensionary benefits after the enhancement of the age of superannuation from 57 to 60 years in the CAPFs.
The Bench recorded that under Rule 43(a) of the CRPF Rules, 1955 and corresponding provisions governing other CAPFs, personnel from the rank of Commandant and below retired at 57 years, while officers above that rank retired at 60 years. In contrast, the Assam Rifles and the CISF had a uniform retirement age of 60 years across ranks. The issue reached the High Court in a series of petitions beginning in 2012, the lead matter being Dev Sharma v. Indo-Tibetan Border Police & Anr., W.P.(C) 1951/2012.
The Court noted that in Dev Sharma, decided on January 31, 2019, the Delhi High Court had held that prescribing different ages of superannuation within the same force created an impermissible classification and violated Article 14 of the Constitution. Rule 43(a) of the CRPF Rules, 1955 and analogous provisions applicable to other CAPFs were therefore declared unconstitutional and struck down. The Court had then directed the Ministry of Home Affairs, in consultation with the CAPFs, to take consequential steps to prescribe a uniform retirement age across ranks.
The Bench extracted paragraphs 70 to 72 of the Dev Sharma judgment. It noted that the earlier Court had directed implementation of the ruling across the board and had clarified that already retired personnel would not be reinstated and would not be entitled to arrears of pay beyond retirement in view of the principle of “no work, no pay.” At the same time, paragraph 72 had said that for purposes of calculation of retiral benefits, including pension and gratuity, the differential period in the event of enhancement of retirement age would be added to the period of service actually rendered and notional retirement dates would be recalculated accordingly.
Pursuant to Dev Sharma, the Ministry of Home Affairs issued Office Order No. F.No.45020/1/2019/Legal-I dated August 19, 2019, fixing the age of superannuation for all CAPF personnel uniformly at 60 years. The Court said that subsequent implementation and clarificatory orders regulated the extension of consequential benefits. By an order dated September 11, 2019, applicable inter alia to BSF personnel, the benefit of exercising the option to rejoin service or of grant of three additional increments was confined to those who had retired between January 31, 2019 and August 19, 2019. Other communications clarified that personnel who had retired before the implementation order were not entitled to reinstatement, and that pensionary benefits would be regulated in accordance with the specified conditions.
The petitioners in the present batch argued that they were identically situated to the petitioners in Dev Sharma and that denial of similar consequential benefits amounted to selective implementation of that judgment. They contended that this resulted in discrimination among similarly placed CAPF pensioners and violated Articles 14, 16 and 21 of the Constitution. The respondents, on the other hand, maintained that the benefits flowing from the earlier judgment did not automatically extend to the present petitioners, who had already superannuated before the Dev Sharma judgment and before any policy decision granting uniform retirement age had been implemented.
The Bench referred to Bharat Singh & Ors. v. Union of India & Ors., W.P.(C) 13195/2019, in which the Delhi High Court had clarified that the benefit of paragraph 72 of Dev Sharma was available only to those CAPF personnel who had retired before January 31, 2019 but had not crossed 60 years of age as on that date. The Court observed that Bharat Singh had also clarified that similarly placed personnel need not independently approach the Court to claim parity. The present Bench further noted that this position was reiterated in Rajender Singh & Ors. v. Union of India & Ors., W.P.(C) 2834/2021, where the Court held that personnel who had already crossed 60 years of age as on January 31, 2019 would not be entitled to continuation in service or consequential financial advantages.
Applying those precedents, the Court held that the petitioners before it had admittedly retired in or before 2016 and had crossed the age of 60 years prior to January 31, 2019. Their claim, the Bench held, was squarely covered by the ratio in Rajender Singh. The Court added that the issue was no longer res integra and that the present proceedings could not be used to challenge the correctness of coordinate Bench judgments in Dev Sharma and Bharat Singh on grounds of arbitrariness or violation of Article 14.
The High Court also held that in service law, salary and attendant monetary benefits are ordinarily premised on actual discharge of duties. Referring to the doctrine of “no work, no pay,” it said that enhancement of the age of superannuation does not, by itself, automatically confer retrospective financial benefits on personnel who had already retired and had not served during the relevant period, unless a specific judicial direction creates such an entitlement. The Court additionally noted that the petitioners had neither challenged their retirement orders at the relevant time nor sought continuation in service when the retirement age issue was pending before the Court. Having accepted superannuation and remained out of service for several years, they could not now claim notional continuation or consequential benefits as though they had remained in service.
In conclusion, the Court held that the petitioners, having retired prior to 2016 and having crossed 60 years of age as on January 31, 2019, were not entitled to the benefit flowing from paragraph 72 of the judgment in Dev Sharma or the subsequent Government order dated August 19, 2019. The entire batch of writ petitions and review petitions was accordingly dismissed, and pending applications, if any, were also disposed of.
