Except Sikhs, No Indian Air Force Man Can Keep Beard: Supreme Court

[SinghStation]

SOURCE: http://singhstation.net/2016/12/except-sikhs-no-indian-air-force-man-can-keep-beard-supreme-court/

The Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the sacking of a Muslim Air Force personnel for sporting a long beard and confirmed that except Sikhs, No Indian Air Force Man Can Keep Beard. The panel remarked that armed forces’ regulations are meant to ensure discipline and uniformity.

The apex court ruled that unless keeping a beard was an integral part of one’s religion, as it is must in the Sikh community, no personnel can be allowed to grow a beard.

Moving the Supreme Court against an order of the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which upheld the Air Force’s August 2005 decision to discharge him for his ‘defiance of IAF rules’, Airman Mohammad Zubair had asserted his right to retain a beard as a ‘facet of his fundamental right to freedom of religion’.

He moved the Supreme Court asserting that keeping a beard was his fundamental right to freedom of religion and demanded equal rights as Sikhs who were in fact given permission to sport unshorn hair and turban.

The current Defence Ministry policy of ‘hair, beard and wearing turbans’ as notified in 2003, allow only those Muslim personnel to keep a beard, who had kept beard along with moustache at the time of joining/enrollment prior to January 1, 2002. Those who have grown a beard after joining service must shave it off.