BIJENDER SINGH RATHORE Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) Invoking the jurisdiction of this Court under Articles 226 and 227 of the Constitution of India, the petitioner has called in question the legal defensibility and substantiality of the order dated 21.3.2011 passed by the Central Administrative Tribunal, Principal Bench, New Delhi (for short the tribunal?) in OA No. 1079/2011 whereby the tribunal has declined to accept the prayer of the petitioner which was made to declare Regulation 4(iii-a) of the Indian Administrative Service (Appointment by Competitive Examination) Regulations, 1955 (for short the 1955 Regulations?) as ultra vires the Constitution of India.

(2.) The facts which are necessitous to be adumbrated are that the Union Public Services Commission (UPSC), vide notification dated 2.1.2010, invited applications for approximately 965 vacancies in different streams of Civil Services. The petitioner submitted his form for selection for the post in the stream of Indian Administrative Service on 27.1.2010. It is not disputed that he was aged about 28 years and had already appeared in the examination four times and the present one was the fifth attempt by him. He appeared in the examination conducted by the UPSC on 23.5.2010 but was denied the result on the ground that he could not have been allowed to sit for the fifth time in the competitive examination as he belonged to the general category. Being dissatisfied with the aforesaid, the petitioner approached the tribunal challenging the said regulation which prohibits a general category candidate to take a fifth attempt to qualify.

(3.) It was contended before the tribunal that the 1955 Regulations restricts the number of attempts for general category candidates upto a maximum of four whereas for OBC category candidates, the maximum number of attempts allowed is seven and for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes candidates, the number of attempts is unlimited. Be it noted, the 1955 Regulations also grant age relaxation to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes categories but the petitioner clearly expressed before the tribunal that he had no grievance with regard to the age relaxation and his grievance was only with regard to the difference in chances offered to the general category candidates vis- -vis other category candidates. It was urged that the 1955 Regulations invited the frown of Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India as there is a restriction on the number of attempts to be made by general category candidates whereas no restriction is made in respect of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes candidates and more number of attempts have been provided for the OBC candidates. It was also urged before the tribunal that in other examinations conducted by the UPSC, there is no such restriction in respect of the number of attempts as seen in the Civil Services Examination but the said restriction is only with regard to the Indian Administrative Service and, hence, the equality clause enshrined under Article 14 of the Constitution is flagrantly violated.