Dr. Tapan Bhattacharya vs Union Of India & Anr

Virender Singh, J.

The petitioner, who is claiming to be a Social Activist, Professor, Scholar and also an Advocate, has raised issue of charge of fees from aspirants of

recruitment and also discrimination in charging such fees for filing the application for recruitment. He urged that this is exploitation and prayed that

Union of India be directed to issue directions to all the States Governments not to charge any fees for application filed in pursuance of any

advertisement issued for the purpose of recruitment by the State Government or its instrumentalities. He also prayed for refund of such fees charged

by Central or the State Governments or its instrumentalities. It is further prayed to direct the respondents to complete the recruitment within six

months.

It is the statement of the learned Senior Counsel appearing for the petitioner that the Respondents are welfare State and they are duty bound to

provide employment to the youths, but instead of discharging their obligation, the States have made this a source of generating income. Further,

according to the petitioner, there is no equality or parity and no common or unanimous guideline or instruction for determining the fees for any such

examination. In most of the cases, the States or its instrumentalities are charging Rs. 500 to 1,000/- per applicant from the poor parents. Recently, the

State had published an advertisement to fill apx. 10,000/posts of Patwari and more than 10 lacs jobless youths applied for the same. 10,00,000 X 500

comes to the tune of Rs. 50 Crore, which the government is earning from unblessed youths. Thus, the State is exploiting helpless youths by charging

arbitrary and excessive fees for entrance examination to various posts. The fees should be commensurate to the services provided by the authorities

or both the respondents. This is in violation of Article 14, 16, 19(1)(g) and 21 of the Constitution. The Constitution gives the right to every citizen, the

right to livelihood, the equality of opportunity in matters of public employment etc. Considering the aforesaid, recently Ministry of Railway has

announced that out of rupees 500 hundreds charged from the aspirants, Rs. 400/- shall be refunded to the applicants.

It is further submitted that existing recruitment process takes six month to 1 year for final selection and issuance of appointment letter to a

candidate; which results in depression and at times they commit suicide. Therefore, as prayed, the respondent should be directed to complete the

process of recruitment within a period of 6 months.

The petitioner has quoted Senior Division Commercial Manager and others Vs SCR caterers, dry fruits, fruit juice stalls welfare association and

another reported in AIR 2016 SSC 668, Maneka Gandhi Vs Union of India Air 1978 SC 596 Jharkhand and another vs Harihar Yadav and others

2014 (2) SCC 114 and prayed for the relief as mentioned in Para-1 above.

We have considered the issue raised by the petitioner. The traditional rule in regard to locus standi is that judicial redress is available only to a

person who has suffered a legal injury by reason of violation of his legal right or legally protected interest by the impugned action of the State or a

public authority.

Hon’ble the Supreme Court has considered the principles governing PIL and locus standi of the petitioner time and again and has issued guide

lines to be followed while entertaining such petition (PIL). We can refer one such guide line issued in State of Uttaranchal Vs. Balwant Singh Chaufal

and Ors AIR 2010 SC 2550. Para 198 of the judgement reads thus:

“198. In order to preserve the purity and sanctity of the PIL, it has become imperative to issue the following directions :-

(1) The courts must encourage genuine and bona fidePIL and effectively discourage and curb the PIL filed for extraneous considerations.

(2) Instead of every individual Judge devising hisown procedure for dealing with the public interest litigation, it would be appropriate for each High

Court to properly formulate rules for encouraging the genuine PIL and discouraging the PIL filed with oblique motives. Consequently, we request that

the High Courts who have not yet framed the rules, should frame the rules within three months. The Registrar General of each High Court is directed

to ensure that a copy of the Rules prepared by the High Court is sent to the Secretary General of this court immediately thereafter.

(3) The courts should prima facie verify thecredentials of the petitioner before entertaining a P.I.L.

(4) The court should be prima facie satisfiedregarding the correctness of the contents of the petition before entertaining a PIL.

(5) The court should be fully satisfied that substantialpublic interest is involved before entertaining the petition.

(6) The court should ensure that the petition whichinvolves larger public interest, gravity and urgency must be given priority over other petitions.

(7) The courts before entertaining the PIL shouldensure that the PIL is aimed at redressal of genuine public harm or public injury. The court should

also ensure that there is no personal gain, private motive or oblique motive behind filing the public interest litigation.

(8) The court should also ensure that the petitions filed by busybodies for extraneous and ulterior motives must be discouraged by imposing exemplary

costs or by adopting similar novel methods to curb frivolous petitions and the petitions filed for extraneous considerations.â€​

The parameters of Public Interest Litigation in matters of service have been highlighted by this Court in many cases. In Gurpal Singh v. State of

Punjab and Ors. (2005 (5) SCC 136) it is noted as follows:

“5. The scope of entertaining a petition styled as a public interest litigation, locus standi of the petitioner particularly in matters involving service of

an employee has been examined by this court in various cases. The Court has to be satisfied about (a) the credentials of the applicant; (b) the prima

facie correctness or nature of information given by him; (c) the information being not vague and indefinite. The information should show gravity and

seriousness involved. Court has to strike balance between two conflicting interests; (i) nobody should be allowed to indulge in wild and reckless

allegations besmirching the character of others; and (ii) avoidance of public mischief and to avoid mischievous petitions seeking to assail, for oblique

motives, justifiable executive actions. In such case, however, the Court cannot afford to be liberal. It has to be extremely careful to see that under the

guise of redressing a public grievance, it does not encroach upon the sphere reserved by the Constitution to the Executive and the Legislature. The

Court has to act ruthlessly while dealing with imposters and busy bodies or meddlesome interlopers impersonating as publicspirited holy men. They

masquerade as crusaders of justice. They pretend to act in the name of Pro Bono Publico, though they have no interest of the public or even of their

own to protect.â€​

In Neetu v. State of Punjab and Ors AIR 2007 SC 758 the Court has reiterated that:

“5. The scope of entertaining a petition styled as a public interest litigation, locus standi of the petitioner particularly in matters involving service of

an employee has been examined by this court in various cases. The Court has to be satisfied about (a) the credentials of the applicant; (b) the prima

facie correctness or nature of information given by him; (c) the information being not vague and indefinite. The information should show gravity and

seriousness involved. Court has to strike balance between two conflicting interests; (i) nobody should be allowed to indulge in wild and reckless

allegations besmirching the character of others; and (ii) avoidance of public mischief and to avoid mischievous petitions seeking to assail, for oblique

motives, justifiable executive actions. In such case, however, the Court cannot afford to be liberal. It has to be extremely careful to see that under the

guise of redressing a public grievance, it does not encroach upon the sphere reserved by the Constitution to the Executive and the Legislature. The

Court has to act ruthlessly while dealing with imposters and busy bodies or meddlesome interlopers impersonating as publicspirited holy men. They

masquerade as crusaders of justice. They pretend to act in the name of Pro Bono Publico, though they have no interest of the public or even of their

own to protect.

Public interest litigation is a weapon which has to be used with great care and circumspection and the judiciary has to be extremely careful to see

that behind the beautiful veil of public interest an ugly private malice, vested interest and/or publicity seeking is not lurking. It is to be used as an

effective weapon in the armoury of law for delivering social justice to the citizens. The attractive brand name of public interest litigation should not be

allowed to be used for suspicious products of mischief. It should be aimed at redressal of genuine public wrong or public injury and not publicity

oriented or founded on personal vendetta. As indicated above, Court must be careful to see that a body of persons or member of public, who

approaches the court is acting bona fide and not for personal gain or private motive or political motivation or other oblique consideration. The Court

must not allow its process to be abused for oblique considerations by masked phantoms who monitor at times from behind. Some persons with vested

interest indulge in the pastime of meddling with judicial process either by force of habit or from improper motives and try to bargain for a good deal as

well to enrich themselves. Often they are actuated by a desire to win notoriety or cheap popularity. The petitions of such busy bodies deserve to be

thrown out by rejection at the threshold, and in appropriate cases with exemplary costs.â€​

The Hon’ble Apex Court in BALCO Employees Union (Regd.) Vs. Union of India and others AIR 2002 SC 350 has observed as under:

“87. It will seen that whenever the Court has interfered and given directions while entertaining PIL it has mainly been where there has been an

element of violations of Article 21 or of human rights or where the litigation has been initiated for the benefit of the poor and the underprivileged who

are unable to come to Court due to some disadvantage. In those cases also it is the legal rights which are secured by the Courts. We may, however,

add that Public Interest Litigation was not meant to be a weapon to challenge the financial or economic decisions which are taken by the Government

in exercise of their administrative power. No doubt a person personally aggrieved by any such decision, which he regards as illegal, can impugn the

same in a Court of law, but, a Public Interest Litigation at the behest of a stranger ought not to be entertained. Such a litigation cannot per se be on

behalf of the poor and the downtrodden, unless the Court is satisfied that there has been violation of Article 21 and the persons adversely affected are

unable to approach the Court.â€​

Thus, it is clear that the court must necessarily abide the parameters which govern exercise of writ jurisdiction. PIL is not maintainable in absence

of injury to any legal right or legally protected interest. In our opinion, the subject or issue raised by the petitioner does not fall within the given

parameters. We have doubts regarding existence of such legal right or interest as claimed by the petitioner. Application fee cannot be equated with

charge or tax. It is not meant to be utilized for purpose of earning revenue but to meet administrative expenses required for conducting the entire

process. None of the aspirant aggrieved by realization of such fee has come before this Court. The petitioner himself is an advocate. He should

refrain to file such petitions. Having regard to the aforesaid, in our view, the petition is not maintainable. We are not inclined to interfere in the subject

matter of the present petition. The petition is accordingly dismissed and disposed of.