SHAILA Vs. KERALA PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION

JUDGEMENT

(1.) APPELLANT was an applicant for the post of High School Assistant in Mathematics for selection conducted for appointment in Government Schools in Alappuzha District. APPELLANT is a female Muslim candidate entitled to appointment in the quota reserved for them. Her application was rejected by the Kerala Public Service Commission for the reason that the application submitted was in a Rs. 5 form which is meant for reserved candidates like Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and not in the Rs. 10/- form which is applicable for all other candidates. The form was purchased from the post office and on account of an inadvertent mistake, the appellant purchased Rs. 5/- form and sent the application. The application was rejected for the simple reason of shortage of Rs 5/- in the value of the application form. However, when the rejection of application was challenged before this court, this court through interim order permitted the appellant to participate in the selection process including interview. P.S.C. conducted selection process and under interim order passed by us Standing Counsel for the Public Service Commission produced the result of selection. It is seen from PSC s communication dated 28.12.2011 that the appellant would have figured Rank No. 4, if her application was accepted as valid. As of now, 8 candidates are appointed and appellant would have already got job if her application was not rejected. Admittedly, list prepared by the P.S.C. is valid and the vacancies are still going to be filled up from the list. Learned Single Judge declined to interfere with the matter by holding that the shortage in application fee, that is the difference between the value of the application used by the appellant as against the value of application she should have used which is Rs. 5 will affect the validity of the application itself. It is against this judgment Writ Appeal is filed. We are unable to accept the reasoning of the learned Single Judge who upheld a hyper technical ground on which an eligible candidate is denied an opportunity to seek employment in Government service. No candidate seeking employment will deliberately try to save Rs. 5/- and stake her future. Therefore, obviously, it is a mistake on the part of the appellant in not sending the form in Rs. 10/- application form. It is not even known whether it was the post office which committed a mistake in giving the form which is valued Rs. 5 as against the form applicable to general candidates which is a Rs. 10 form. Further it is seen that appellant is also a candidate enjoying preference in selection through reservation and so much so, she would have been led to believe that Rs. 5 application applies for all candidates having preference of reservation. Therefore, on equitable grounds we allow the Writ Appeal by vacating the judgment of the learned Single Judge with a direction to the P.S.C. to include the appellant as No.4 in the rank list and give her appointment in the next vacancy in the merit quota or in the next Muslim quota which ever is earlier. However, we make it clear that the appellant will not have any claim for seniority over those who have been already appointed based on the rank list prepared by the P.S.C. Before parting with the subject, we feel in matters like this P.S.C. should behave like a human agency and not like a machine. Therefore, before rejection of applications P.S.C. should consider whether rejections are on such grounds on which the Courts will interfere to render justice to parties and if so P.S.C. itself should allow a mistake to be corrected or an omission to be made up so that parties are not unnecessarily dragged to Court; followed up by P.S.C.