Vikas vs State of Punjab

R.L. Anand, J.—Vikas Kumar petitioner has filed the present writ petition under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of the India against the State of Punjab, Director Animal Husbandry and College of Veterinary Science (respondent No. 1 to 3) and he has made a prayer that directions be issued to the respondents to admit the petitioner in the Veterinary Pharmacist Training Course for 2 years for the Session 2000-2001 to be commenced from March 2001 as the petitioner is fully eligible and he fulfils all the requisite qualifications.

The case set up by the petitioner is that the respondent No. 2 issued an advertisement in the month of August 2000 for 200 seats for admission in the Veterinary Pharmacist training Course in the College of Veterinary Science, Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana and the applications duly completed in all respects, were required to be submitted by 25th August, 2000 and the entrance test was to be conducted on 24th September, 2000. The minimum ''qualification prescribed for general category for the said course was matric with 50% or 10+2 with Physics, Chemistry and Biology with 50 marks with Punjabi subject up to matric standard. The petitioner possessed the requisite qualification and he applied for the said course within the stipulated period. The petitioner was allotted Roll No. 3140 in the general category. He appeared in the Entrance Test on 24th September, 2000. The result of the'' Entrance Test was declared on 31st October, 2000 and the petitioner was qualified and he was ranked at Serial No. 19 in the General category. On the basis of his performance in the Entrance Test, interview was fixed for 21st November, 2000. After qualifying the Entrance Test, petitioner appeared in the interview. The result of interview was declared on 24th January, 2001, through which the petitioner was declared unsuccessful. To the utter surprise of the petitioner, the person lower in rank in merit as shown in the result, has been selected for admission. The action of the respondent is totally arbitrary, discriminatory in nature and in violation of the provisions of Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India. The petitioner is a matriculate and he secured 1st Division in the Matric Examination. He also possessed the qualification of 10+2 and secured 1st Division. He also qualified the examination of B.A. Part-I from the Punjab University and his result was declared on 22th August, 2000. The respondents have adopted pick and choose policy and the person lower in rank to the petitioner has been admitted in the course. The candidate with Roll No. 8024 who was at Sri. No. 46 has been selected and granted admission, whereas the petitioner who got rank 19 has been ignored without any reason. With this background, the petitioner has made a prayer for the issuance of a writ of mandamus.

Notice of the writ petition was given to the respondents. A joint written statement was filed on behalf of respondent Nos. 1 and 2 in which they have denied the allegations. The respondents admit that the petitioner appeared in the interview and was declared unsuccessful in the final merit list prepared as per the criteria given in the admission notice dated 27th July, 2000. The admission to the Veterinary course was not to be made only on the performance of the written test but on the basis of the merit to be computed by considering performance in the Entrance Test, Matriculation Examination and the interview. The merit on the basis of the written Entrance Test was of 50% of the total marks, 35 marks were given to the, petitioner on the basis of the Matric Examination; 15 marks were to be given on the basis of the performance in the interview conducted by the Committee and the final merit list was to be determined by adding of the marks. According to the respondents, no pick and choose method was adopted. Mere securing higher marks than others in the written test does not confer any right upon a candidate to get admission in the said training course and the same was to be made on the basis of the overall merit to be computed by considering performance in the Entrance test. With this broad defence, respondent Nos. 1 and 2 prayed for the dismissal of the writ petition.

No written statement was filed on behalf of respondent No. 3 though it was represented by Shri Deepak Agnihotri.

I have heard Shri R.S. Chauhan on behalf of the petitioner, Ms. Gurveen, H. Singh Deputy Advocate General on behalf of the respondent Nos. 1 and 2 and Shri Deepak Agnihotri on behalf of the respondents No. 3 and with their assistance, have gone through the record of this case.

If we revert to this advertisement, it was stated on the notice that the selection of the candidates will be made on the basis of the performance in the Entrance Test (50%), Eligibility Condition (45%) and Interview (15%). This Court feels that interview is an important factor and if some marks have been reserved for the purpose of interview, this criteria is not bad. In this case, only 15 marks had been allotted to the Interview Committee and every candidate was supposed to get 15% of the 15 marks which comes to roughly 2.5%. Similarly, there is no wrong if the Selection Committee has laid down a condition that candidate must get 50% marks out of the total marks allotted for the Entrance Test. In the present case, 50 marks were allotted for the examination. Also, I do not see illegality to the eligibility condition when the advertisement has stated that 35% credit of the basic examination marks will be given. During the course of submission, the record of the Selection Committee was also produced. The name of the petitioner is at merit No. 19. He is Matric and thereafter he did his 10+2. In the Matric out of 650 marks he secured 425 marks. At the ratio of 35%, the Selection Committee has given the benefit to him of 22.88 units. Out of 50 marks allocated in the Entrance Test, the petitioner has got 40.25 units. Out of 100 marks, the petitioner has been granted benefit of 40.25 units at the parameter of 50% marks and thus, total comes to 63.13 units and the interview committee only gave him 3 marks and, thus, the total comes to 66.13 units.

The grouse of the learned counsel for the petitioner is that once the selection Committee has awarded units on the basis of the basic merit of a candidate and on the basis of the Entrance test, then Selection Committee should be adopted a rational view in awarding the marks in the interview but in the present case, it has done in an arbitrary manner. The counsel submitted that a candidate who had less units has been given more marks as compared to the petitioner so as to exclude the petitioner from the final list. He has pointed out several instances where a candidate with lower units had got marks even to the extent of 10, 11 out of 15 but in the case of the petitioner, only three marks have been given. Counsel submitted that the last candidate who was accommodated in the final list got 60.30 units and still he was given 6 marks in the interview raising his total units 66.30, whereas the petitioner was given only three units, without any basis when his basic units were 66.13. This arbitrary decision on the part of the Selection Committee suggests that the members of the Committee wanted to accommodate certain persons.

On the contrary, learned counsel appearing on behalf of respondent Nos. 1 and 2 submits that interview marks must be reserved by the Selection Committee and irrespective of the fact that a candidate gets higher unit is not entitled to get more marks in the interview on that strength. He further stated that it all depends upon performance of the candidate and this court cannot sit over the decision of the Selection Committee regarding opinion formulated by the Selection Committee at the time of the interview.

I have considered the rival contentions of the parties and in my opinion, this writ petition deserves to succeed.

Admittedly, the petitioner''s aggregate was 63.13 units. The last person who came in the final list is Shri Kanwaljit Singh Roll No. 4518 at Sri. No. 85. His total marks are 66.30. His total aggregate was 60.30. He was given 6 marks in the interview making it 66.30. At Sri. No. 29 the name of the candidate is Shri Sanjeev Kumar Roll No. 259. Out of his total marks 60.92 he was given 9 marks in the interview so as to make 69.92 units. At Sri. No. 30 Roll No. 340 Shri Harpreet Singh per 61.62 units below the units of the petitioners still he given 8 marks. Even those candidates who have given in the rank of 50 have been given marks in such a fashion that they can be easily accommodated for the course. There is no rationality or valid criteria for the allocation of the marks. When a candidate gets 54.34 units like Shri Harvinder Singh Sandhu Roll No. 7752 at Serial No. 147 he is given 12 marks. Similarly Jaswinder Singh Bath at Serial No. 144 has been given 9-1/2 marks. Miss Lovely Bansal has been given 11 marks in spite of the fact that her total aggregate in terms of unit was 67.13 at Serial No. 152 Roll No. 1947. This arbitrary mode of awarding the marks has caused a serious prejudice to the petitioner and in these circumstances, he is entitled to the admission to the said, course.

During the course of submission, it was represented to the Court that at present no seat is lying vacant. The Court had option to quash the entire selection to the said course, but keeping in view the fact that 200 children are already getting training in the said Course since February 2001, it may not be desirable for this Court to upset the entire-selection. But the petitioner cannot be penalised for the wrong criteria adopted by the Selection Committee or the Interviewing Committee. The right of the petitioner has to be redressed.

In these circumstances, I give directions to the respondent-authorities to create a seat in the course in question so that the petitioner may be adjusted. Resultantly, the writ petition is hereby allowed and issue a writ of mandamus to the respondents to admit the petitioner in the Veterinary Pharmacist Training Course for two years for the Session 2000-2001 and his admission be regularised by creating a post within two months from receipt of a copy of this order. Till the seat is regularised, the petitioner shall be admitted provisionally on payment of usual fees so that his studies and lectures may not suffer and this part of the direction shall be complied with by respondent Nos. 2 to 3 within a period of eight days on receipt of a copy of this judgment. There shall be no order as to costs.

Petition allowed.