The Delhi high court has stayed an army order discharging a Naib Subedar from service on medical ground and sought a response from the Centre and the army on his plea challenging similar action against 27,000 other personnel.

Directing the army to allow Naib Subedar Vijay Kumar Dubedi to continue in service till further orders, a division bench of Justice Vikramjit Sen and Justice S L Bhayana asked the Centre and the chief of army staff to file their replies by May 14.

The bench, in a recent order, also stayed the department's order issued in October through which Dubedi was discharged from service.

In his petition, filed through his counsel Siddharth Shankar Ray and Abhik Kumar, Dubedi alleged that the army has discharged him and other personnel in violation of the rules and regulations for the medical services of armed forces.

Seeking quashing of the discharge order, his counsel submitted that before conducting medical tests on the personnel, the department should have constituted an Invalidating Board and thereafter taken a decision to remove them from the service on medical ground.

In April, the army headquarters issued a letter saying, 'In the interest of smooth manpower management, discharge of existing permanent LMC personnel will be carried out in a phased manner.'

The army decided a total number of 26,706 personnel would be discharged from the service following the letter.