SHAHID ALI Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The present petition filed as a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) impugns the Notification dated 5th March, 2013 of the respondent no.2 Union Public Service Commission (UPSC) whereby Arabic and Persian have been excluded from the list of optional subjects mentioned in Group-II "literature of languages" of the Main Examination for the Civil Services conducted by the UPSC. The petition also seeks a direction to the respondents to again include Arabic and Persian as subjects in which the candidates can take the said examination.

(2.) The petitioner claims to be a practicing Advocate of this Court and is neither a candidate for the said examination nor an aspirant for the Civil Services. We have as such enquired from the counsel for the petitioner as to how the issue can be taken up as PIL. It is not as if the persons if any affected or aggrieved by the impugned Notification are not in a position to themselves approach this Court. Such persons if any, being aspirants to the Civil Services of this Country, are more than well equipped to and capable of, if aggrieved from exclusion of Arabic and Persian language from the subjects in which the said examination can be taken, to themselves challenge the same.

(3.) The legal tool of Public Interest Litigation was invented by the Courts as an exception to the otherwise well established rule, of only a person having cause of action or locus standi being entitled to approach the Court. Such invention was deemed necessary finding that in certain situations, owing to social or economic backwardness or other reasons the aggrieved parties were themselves unable to approach the Court (see S.P. Gupta Vs. UOI, 1981 Supp1 SCC 87 and State of Uttaranchal Vs. Balwant Singh Chaufal, 2010 3 SCC 402). The field of operation of the said tool was expanded to cover situations where a general direction of the Court was deemed necessary, not for the benefit of any one person or a group of persons but for the benefit of the public generally viz. protection and preservation of ecology, environment etc. and for maintaining probity, transparency and integrity in governance. The Supreme Court else has been repeatedly issuing warnings, of allowing the said tool of Public Interest Litigation to be misused (see Balco Employees Union (Regd.) Vs. Union of India, 2002 2 SCC 333). The petitioner has been unable to satisfy us as to how it is entitled to file this petition in public interest. The warnings issued by the Supreme Court, of Public Interest Litigation becoming Publicity Interest Litigation (see Neetu Vs. State of Punjab, 2007 10 SCC 614) and of allowing "meddlesome interlopers" to file Public Interest Litigation (see S..P. Gupta supra) is apposite in this regard. Similarly, in Holicow Pictures Pvt. Ltd. Vs. Prem Chandra Mishra, 2008 AIR(SC) 913 it was held that Public Interest Litigation is to be used for delivering social justice to the citizens.