UNION PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION Vs. SHIV SHAMBHU

JUDGEMENT

(1.) THE Union Public Service Commission ( UPSC ) has in this appeal challenged the judgment dated 17th April 2007 passed by the learned Single Judge of this court dismissing its Writ Petition (C) No. 17583 of 2006. The UPSC had filed the said writ petition seeking the quashing of an order dated 13th November 2006 passed by the Central Information Commission ( CIC ), New Delhi allowing the appeal filed by the Respondents herein under Section 19 (3) of the Right to information Act, 2005 ( RTI Act ).

(2.) AT the outset this Court directs the deletion of the CIC which has been arrayed as Respondent No. 1 to this appeal, consequent upon it being arrayed as such in the writ petition. This Court has repeatedly issued practice directions stressing that a judicial or quasi-judicial body or Tribunal whose order is challenged in a writ petition (and thereafter possibly in appeal) ought not to itself be impleaded as a party respondent. The only exception would be if malafides are alleged against any individual member of such authority or tribunal in which case again it would be such member, and not the authority/tribunal, who may be impleaded as a respondent. Accordingly the cause title of the present appeal will read as Union Public Service Commission v. Shiv shambhu and Ors.

(3.) THE Respondents herein were candidates who had appeared in the Civil Services (Preliminary) Examination, 2006. The Civil Services Examination (CSE) - which is in two parts, a preliminary examination followed by a Main examination - is a competitive examination held every year by the UPSC, a constitutional authority under Article 320 of the Constitution of India. The successful candidates are, in the order of their merit, recruited to the Indian Administrative Service, indian Foreign Service, Indian Police Service and non-technical Civil Services. Pursuant to the recommendations of the Kothari Committee in 1974-77, which was constituted by the central government, changes were introduced in the pattern of the CSE. This was followed by another review carried out by the Satish Chandra committee in 1988-89 whereafter certain other changes were introduced. Importantly one of the recommendations made by the Kothari Committee was in regard to adopting of scaling of marks for different papers using appropriate statistical techniques.