K. Palanikumar vs The Chief General Manager, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd., Chennai, The Chief General Manager, Telecommunications, Chennai, K.R. Lakshmi, Junior Telecom Officer, Telephone Exchange, Oddanchatram, Dindigul District and The Central Administrative Tribunal, Chennai Beach, High Court Complex, Chennai

V.S. Sirpurkar, J.—Rule returnable forthwith. Senior Central Government Standing Counsel takes notice for the respondents.

In this writ petition the Challenge is to the Tribunal''s order by which the Tribunal dismissed the revaluation application filed by the petitioner

herein. The petitioner was working as a telephone operator and the promotional post to that post is Junior Telecom Officer for which there is a

competitive examination. Therefore, the petitioner took the said examination. However, he was not successful and therefore claimed statement of

marks, which established that he obtained 205 marks. He applied for re-totalling. However, after re-totalling also the position did not change. He

did not reach the cut off mark which was at 214 marks. He therefore sought for the re-valuation. Revaluation was not granted to him relying on

Rule-15 which prohibits revaluation. He therefore challenges the constitutionality of the rule which prohibits the revaluation. The Tribunal however

dismissed the matter in liminie, taking the view that there was no right conferred on any examinee for revaluation. The Tribunal for this observation,

relied on the decision reported in Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary Education and Another Vs. Paritosh

Bhupeshkumar Sheth and Others, and held that there was no scope for holding that the Rule was in any way bad. Therefore, the Tribunal

dismissed the application necessitating this petition.

Mr. P. V. S. Giridhar, Learned counsel for the petitioner to begin with, contended that there were a number of irregularities in this examination

and number of students were granted marks after re-totalling and even such marks were later on changed on further correction which shows that

there were mal-practice in the examination. He secondly says that the rule making authorities do not have the power to fix rules for holding the

examination and therefore, the whole exercise itself was bad in law and even holding the examination. He then says that there were no safeguards

ensuring the fairness of the examination and more particularly the valuation process and as such the rule which prohibits the re-valuation would be

obviously opposed to the principle of Art. 14, being arbitrary and discriminatory.

We shall take the second contention first. It must be stated that in contending that there were no valid rules for holding examination and as such

it could not be held for the purpose of promotions, the petitioner is entering into a dangerous area. It is trite law that a person who takes part in the

selection process and finds himself not selected, cannot turn back and challenge the selection process. In challenging the validity of examination

itself, the petitioner is trying to do that exactly. Therefore this challenge of Mr. Giridhar will have to be rejected.

As for the first contention that there were a number of irregularities in connection with the re-totalling of the marks, the contention is totally

irrelevant to the subject of evaluation of papers. Even if there were irregularities in totalling, those irregularities would not ensure that there was

something wrong with the valuation process of the answer papers. Nothing has been brought on record or pleaded in this petition to show that the

process of valuation suffered from any defect. Under such circumstances, merely because few students'' marks were re-totalled, corrected and on

that basis re-corrected, it cannot be said that the whole valuation process was bad and as such the students concerned have the right to get the

papers re-valued. This argument also has to be rejected.

Mr. Giridhar, pointed out the observation made by the Supreme Court in Para-26 of the afore-mentioned decision cited supra, wherein the

Supreme Court has expressed as to what would be the fair play in the matter of correction of the answer papers and the valuation process.

According to the learned counsel, no such fair play is available in the facts and circumstances of this case. We do not agree with this contention.

The first principle culled out in this decision is, where there is no rule for re-valuation, there would not be any such right for re-valuation . The

Supreme Court further goes to suggest in para-29 of the said decision, that in the academic matters at least the courts should be slow to interfere,

more particularly in the matter of revaluation . Because that would be unfair for all other who appeared for the examination and succeeded.

As for the safeguards for the fair play being absent a general pleading cannot be made even without providing any material to show that any

irregularities occurred in the process of evaluation. Such material is nowhere to be found in the petition. Therefore a mere allegation by itself would

not entitle the petitioner to attack the validity of the rule. The decision therefore does not help the petitioner.

We do not find any arguments advanced regarding the rule concerned being discriminatory or being arbitrary in any manner and no material has

been brought before us. No other point has been argued. Therefore, we do not find any merit in the writ petition and the writ petition is dismissed,

but without any order as to costs. Consequently WPMP.No.48831 of 2002 is closed.