AIRPORT AUTHORITY OF INDIA Vs. SHAM KRISHNA B

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The appeal is filed by the Airport Authority of India [AAI] against the judgment of the learned Single Judge in a writ petition, where the 1 st respondent was the writ petitioner. The writ petitioner, an applicant to the post of Junior Assistant (Fire Services) was aggrieved with denial of appointment. There were a total of 245 posts notified of which 122 were Un-Reserved (UR), 78 reserved for Other Backward Castes (OBC), 22 for Scheduled Castes (SC) and 22 + 1 for Scheduled Tribes (ST); +1 being a carried forward vacancy. A selection, comprising of written test, driving test, physical endurance test and interview, was conducted. We need not look at the essential qualifications for the post since there is no dispute on that and the writ petitioner too is qualified for the post.

(2.) The petitioner obtained 56.92% marks and had a rank of 165 which however, was only later revealed to the applicant on a query made under the Right to Information Act (RTI). We notice this specifically since there is a ground of delay raised by the AAI, which we will have to address first. The contention raised by the petitioner was that the application of reservation by the AAI was flawed, and not as per roster mandated by the Central Government, which was accepted by the learned Single Judge. The learned Single Judge directed the respondents to prepare and publish a rank list in accordance with the recruitment rules, Ext.P15, from amongst five times the number of posts notified. If the number of applicants is lesser, from among all the applicants, re-arranging the candidates in accordance with the model roster in the Appendix to Annexure II to Ext.P6; against the respective reserved/unreserved posts as indicated in Ext.P14 and thereafter to make appointments against the remaining notified posts.

(3.) We have heard the learned Standing Counsel appearing for the AAI, Sri. V. Santharam and Sri. M.R.Hariraj, learned Counsel appearing for the petitioner as also the additional respondent who is impleaded in this appeal, who also has the very same contention as the applicant.