APPALA NAIDU Vs. A P PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioners are two in number. Both of them are in the State Government service. The first petitioner having entered the Government service as a Junior Assistant in the Police Department on 1-7-1972 is today working as the camp-clerk to the Deputy Superintendent of Police, Palakonda, Srikakulam District. He has put in more than 11 years of service. The 2nd petitioner who was, first appointed to the Government service as a Junior Assistant on 5-2-1975 has worked for more than eight years in the same Department. Both the petitioners belong to the Andhra Pradesh Ministerial Services and come from the backward classes. The first petitioner was born on 1st March, 1950 and the 2nd petitioner was born on 7th May, 1949. In this writ petition, these petitioners are seeking appointment as Sub Inspectors of Police.

(2.) The Andhra Pradesh Public Service Commission through its notification of January, 1983, had invited applications from the candidates seeking recruitment to the posts of the Sub Inspectors either by the method of direct recruitment or by the method of recruitment by transfer. To response to that notification of January, 1983, the two petitioners had applied to the A.P. Public Service Commission to be recruited as Sub- Inspectors of Police. AH the applications received by the Public Service Commission were subjected to a preliminary scrutiny by the Public Service Commission and the Public Service Commission acting on those results allowed the petitioners to sit for the preliminary examination then being conducted by the Public Service Commission on 17th April, 1983 for the purpose of weeding out some of the candidates. The petitioners successfully went through that preliminary examination. But, later en, the Public Service Commission refused the petitioners permission to sit for the final examination, without the passing of which they could not hope to be selected as Sub-Inspectors. The reason for this refusal according to the Public Servioe Commission was that both the petitioners were over-aged. The first petitioner received a memo to that effect from the Public Service Commission on 19th December, 1963, informing him that his admission to the selection was cancelled. Similar communication was also received by the 2nd petitioner from the Public Service Commission around the sans time.

(3.) The writ petition has been filed by the petitioners with two distinct and somewhat mutually contradictory prayers. The first prayer in the writ petition is that this Court should direct the Public Service Commission to make selection of Sub-Inspectors of Police in Zone No. 1 reserved for the ministerial staff of Police Department by declaring the rejection of the applications of the petitioners by the Public Service Commission as illegal and void. The second prayer is that this Court should direct the Board of Deputy Inspector General of Police, represented by the Deputy Inspector General of Police, Visakhapatnam range, Visakhapatnam, to take steps for selection from the ministerial staff members including the petitioners herein for filling up of the vacancies of Sub-Inspectors in Zone No. 1 intended to be filled by ministerial staff pursuant to the power conferred upon them in G.O.Ms. No. 676 dated 31-12-1980. The second prayer by the petitioners is linked with the granting of the first prayer by its being described as a consequential prayer.