PRABIN KESRI Vs. ARCHEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE present writ petition is concerned with the appointments to the 24 posts of ?Deputy Superintending Archaeologist? at Archaeological Survey of India, which is to be done on the basis of selection. An advertisement was taken out on 10.04.2010, inviting applications for the same. THE essential qualifications for the same, inter alia, included:-

(2.) THE petitioners approached the Central Administrative Tribunal, Principal Bench, New Delhi, by virtue of an OA No. 913/2011, on two grounds. It was contended by them that the recruitment test ought to have been in Hindi and not in English on account of the fact that one of the essential qualifications specified in the initial advertisement, was a Master?s Degree in languages such as, Sanskrit, Persian, Prakrit, Pali, Arabic etc. THE argument advanced by the learned counsel for the petitioners was that those candidates, who had post graduate degrees in languages other than English, would be put to a disadvantage by the stipulation that the medium of the test would be English only. It was suggested that the medium of the test ought to have been Hindi because that is the official language of the Government of India.

(3.) INSOFAR as the second point urged on behalf of the petitioners was concerned, the respondents had taken the plea that the written test was only a screening test and that the eligibility condition was to be gone into after the screening test and it is only those persons, who were found to be eligible, who would be called for the interview. In other words, the stand of the respondents was that no ineligible person would be called for the interview.