RAKTIM NAG Vs. STATE OF WEST BENGAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) By order dated 8th January, 2010, this Court directed the West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education to affirm an affidavit indicating whether or not the answer scripts are available since it was brought to the notice of the Court that as per practice, the answer scripts are preserved for six months by the Council and the examination having been held in the year 2007, there was no direction for preservation of answer scripts. Today, when the matter was taken up for further consideration, an affidavit affirmed by the Assistant Secretary (Law) of the West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education is filed wherefrom it appears that the answer scripts of the Kolkata Regional Office (KRO) for the year 2007 were lifted for the purpose of eventual disposal between 14th December, 2007, and 17th December, 2007. It has also been stated therein that once the process of lifting gets underway, it is impossible to identify and trace out answer scripts of a particular candidate from the lakhs of answer scripts stored in the godown. It has also been stated in the said affidavit that copy of the earlier writ petition filed by the writ Petitioner, being W. P. No. 19418(W) of 2007 was served on the Respondent Council along with a forwarding letter of his learned advocate Mr. Mrinal Kanti Mukherjee, dated 19th December, 2007 by Registered Post, which was received on 26th December, 2007. It has been specifically stated in the affidavit that the Council did not have any knowledge of filing of the earlier writ petition, till the date of intimation received from the learned advocate, which was on 26th December, 2007, by which time the answer scripts of the writ Petitioner had already been dumped in the godown. It has also been stated in the affidavit that the Post Publication Scrutiny result of the writ Petitioner has been duly published and forwarded to his school along with the result of all other candidates who had applied for Post Publication Scrutiny, within time.

(2.) In view of what has been stated in the affidavit affirmed on behalf of the West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education, I do not find any merits in the submission made by the learned advocate for the writ Petitioner that it was incumbent upon the Council to have kept the answer scripts of the writ Petitioner preserved. There was no direction given by this Court in the instant matter, at any stage, upon the West Bengal Council of Higher Secondary Education, for preservation of the answer scripts of the writ Petitioner. Even in the earlier writ petition moved before this Court, there was no such order. From the records, it appears that the instant writ petition has been filed before this Court on 9th July, 2008, that is to say, after almost seven months from the dates mentioned in paragraph 4 of the said affidavit of the Council when the answer scripts of the Kolkata Regional Office were lifted for the purpose of eventual disposal.

(3.) The learned advocate for the writ Petitioner has relied on a judgment of the Supreme Court in the case of Union of India and Anr. v. Ex. Major Sudershan Gupta, 2009 6 SCC 298 and submits it was incumbent upon the Council to have kept the answer scripts of the writ Petitioner preserved in the facts and circumstances of the instant case.