Orissa high court upholds govt decision to exclude some SHGs from paddy procurement

Cuttack: Orissa high court has upheld the state govt’s decision to exclude certain women’s self-help groups (SHGs) from paddy procurement for the 2025-26 season, ruling that their engagement since 2019 did not create any vested or enforceable right to continue indefinitely.

A bench of Justice Sashikanta Mishra recently dismissed a batch of 13 petitions filed by SHGs from Subarnapur district, which claimed they were duly selected through an open expression of interest (EOI) in 2019 and had been engaged in kharif and rabi procurement for four consecutive years on behalf of the Odisha State Civil Supplies Corporation (OSCSC). The petitioners challenged their exclusion this year, alleging that procurement was restricted to primary agricultural credit societies (PACS) without assigning reasons or granting them a hearing.

Rejecting the plea, Justice Mishra observed, “It cannot be disputed that the engagement of WSHGs under the 2019 guidelines is administrative and a matter of policy of the state.”

He held that the guidelines were executive instructions framed to facilitate procurement and did not confer any statutory or vested right either to existing SHGs to continue indefinitely as a matter of right.

The court noted that from 2019 to 2024, the state consistently continued with the already selected SHGs without issuing fresh EOIs and that such continuation was uniform and never challenged. “Mere deviation from a procedural prescription in an executive guideline, in the absence of demonstrable arbitrariness or violation of statutory provisions does not… render the action of the state illegal,” Justice Mishra said in his Dec 19, 2025, order.

Referring to the govt’s decision of July 12, 2024, to undertake a performance review of SHGs, the court held that the subsequent district-wide assessment in Subarnapur was a policy decision taken in public interest. It recorded that the govt adopted a principle whereby SHGs with satisfactory track records were allowed to continue, PACS were preferred where required, and EOIs were issued only in areas where mismanagement was reported. Such classification, the court said, had a direct nexus with efficient procurement and did not violate Article 14 of the Constitution.

While declining to interfere, Justice Mishra however, observed that, in keeping with women empowerment, the govt should consider providing adequate opportunities to new SHGs and those earlier debarred for mismanagement in future procurement years, without compromising efficiency and transparency.

On natural justice, the court ruled that the disengagement was neither penal nor stigmatic and imposed no civil disability. “In such circumstances, insistence on individual showcause notices or personal hearings cannot be treated as mandatory,” it held, adding that the principles of natural justice were substantially complied with.