‘Can’t grow beard in armed forces on religious ground’

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday rejected a plea by an IAF personnel seeking to grow a beard and said that the IAF’s policies were not intended to discriminate against religious beliefs.
“Regulation and policies in regard to personal appearances are not intended to discriminate against religious beliefs, nor do they have the affect of doing so,” a bench of Chief Justice T.S. Thakur, Justice D.Y. Chandrachud and Justice L. Nageswara Rao said while rejecting the plea by Mohammed Zubair.
Zubair, who joined the IAF on December 19, 2001, has since been discharged from service.
Zubair had on January 10, 2005, applied for permission to sport a beard but the plea was rejected by the Air Officer Commanding. He subsequently challenged the directions in the court.
“Their object and purpose is to ensure uniformity, cohesiveness, discipline and order which are indispensable to the Air Force, as indeed to every armed force,” the ruling said.
Justice Chandrachud said: “India is a secular nation in which every religion must be treated with equality. In the context of the Armed Forces, which comprise men and women following a multitude of faiths, the needs of secular India are accommodated by recognising the right of worship and by respecting religious beliefs.”
Zubair had moved the apex court to challenge the Punjab and Haryana High Court judgment that held that maintaining a beard was not an integral part of his religion. (IANS)