Nitai Chandra Roy and Subhas Banerjee vs Director General, CISF and Others

K. Chandru, J.—The petitioners are the members of the Central Industrial Security Force and at present, they are attached to the APSU,

Airport, Chennai. In both the cases, the prayer of the petitioners is for a direction to the respondents to include them in the merit list for the post of

Sub-Inspector (Exe) under the LDCE 2007 in the CISF and to grant all necessary benefits with effect from 30.6.2007.

At the time of admission of the petitions, notice was taken by the learned Counsel for the respondents and a common counter affidavit dated

16.10.2007 has been filed on behalf of the respondents 1 and 4. Heard the arguments of Mr. Md. Ibrahim Ali, learned Counsel appearing for the

petitioner and Mr. A.S. Vijayaraghavan, learned Additional Central Government Standing Counsel representing the respondents and perused the

records.

It is seen from the records that a Notification for recruitment of Sub-Inspectors (Exe) through Limited Departmental Competitive Examination

[for short, ''LDCE''] 2007 was advertised for the year 2007 and totally 168 vacancies were advertised out of which 131 was for unreserved

categories and the rest of them were for SC / ST categories. The petitioners had applied for the said post and call letters for the examination were

sent to them by a letter dated 12.5.2007. Thereafter, the candidates, who became successful in the examination, were called for medical

examination. The grievance of the petitioners is that though the petitioners were declared qualified both in the physical efficiency test and interview,

their name did not figure in the selection list. Their allegations is that extraneous consideration and undue influence played a part in the selection and

because of that, they were not selected. Except such a bald statement, no other averments were made by the petitioners. Though the petitioners

have made the respondents 2 and 3 as parties in their individual capacities, no specific allegations have been made against these two officers, viz.,

Inspector General, CISF and Deputy Inspector General respectively of the North Zone.

In the counter affidavit, it is clearly set out that the petitioner in W.P. No. 23973 of 2007 had secured 368 marks out of 600 marks and ranked

252 in the merit list. The petitioner in W.P. No. 23974 of 2007 had secured 379 marks out of 600 marks and his rank in the merit list was 203. It

was only because they were nowhere in the zone of consideration in the merit list and it was emphasised that no candidate who had secured lesser

marks than the petitioners from the unreserved categories have been selected and there was no irregularity or undue favour was shown to any

person.

Mr. Md. Ibrahim Ali, learned Counsel appearing for the petitioners, inspite of the counter affidavit filed by the respondents, wanted this Court to

direct the officers to submit the entire selection list and emphasised that this Court must be satisfied with the select list by going into the records and

seeing as to how each candidate has been given the mark. This Court is unable to accede to the request of the petitioners for the simple reason that

excepting some bald allegations, the petitioners have not come forward with any clear case so as to doubt the conduct of the respondents. Even in

the counter affidavit, there is a specific denial of the allegations made against the Officers. Further, the petitioners have miserably failed to show as

to how the respondents 2 and 3 played any personal role in the matter of selection so as to have undue influence exerted in the matter of selection.

In this context, it is relevant to the refer to the decision of the Supreme Court reported in Maharashtra State Board of Secondary and Higher

Secondary Education and Another Vs. Paritosh Bhupeshkumar Sheth and Others, and paragraphs 28 and 29 of the said judgment are relevant to

be extracted herein.

Para 28: As pointed out by a Constitution Bench of this Court in Fatehchand Himmatlal v. State of Maharashtra ""the test of reasonableness is not

applied in vacuum but in the context of life''s realities"". If the principle laid down by the High Court is to be regarded as correct, its applicability

cannot be restricted to examinations conducted by School Education Boards alone but would extend even to all competitive examinations

conducted by the Union and State Public Service Commissions. The resultant legal position emerging from the High Court judgment is that every

candidate who has appeared for any such examination and who is dissatisfied with his results would, as an inherent part of his right to ""fair play"" be

entitled to demand a disclosure and personal inspection of his answer scripts and would have a further right to ask for revaluation of his answer

papers. The inevitable consequence would be that there will be no certainty at all regarding the results of the competitive examination for an

indefinite period of time until all such requests have been complied with and the results of the verification an d revaluation have been brought into

account.

Para 29: Far from advancing public interest and fair play to the other candidates in general, any such interpretation of the legal position would be

wholly defeasive of the same. As has been repeatedly pointed out by this Court, the Court should be extremely reluctant to substitute its own views

as to what is wise, prudent and proper in relation to academic matters in preference to those formulated by professional men possessing technical

expertise and rich experience of actual day-to-day working of educational institutions and the departments controlling them. It will be wholly wrong

for the Court to make a pedantic and purely idealistic approach to the problems of this nature, isolated from the actual realities and grass root

problems involved in the working of the system and unmindful of the consequences which would emanate if a purely idealistic view as opposed to a

pragmatic one were to be propounded. It is equally important that the Court should also, as far as possible, avoid any decision or interpretation of

a statutory provision, rule or bye-law which would bring about the result of rendering the system unworkable in practice. It is unfortunate that this

principle has not been adequately kept in mind by the High Court while deciding the instant case.

In the light of the above, both the writ petitions are misconceived and devoid of merits. Accordingly, both the petitions will stand dismissed.

However, there will be no order as to costs. Connected Miscellaneous Petitions are closed.