RAJESH DHANUKA Vs. STATE OF WEST BENGAL

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These two writ petitions are directed against an undated order of the Director, District Distribution, Procurement and Supply (hereafter the Director), which was conveyed, inter alia, to the two petitioners vide memo dated May 3, 2013. While acting in compliance with an order dated May 16, 2012 passed by an Hon'ble Division Bench of this Court, the Director opined that neither of the two petitioners was capable of performing distribution of foodgrains from their offered locations and that they are not eligible for appointment as distributor under the West Bengal Public Distribution System (Maintenance and Control) Order, 2003 (hereafter the Order). It was, accordingly, directed that the candidature of all the applicants who had applied pursuant to the vacancy notice dated February 8, 2006 stands cancelled. There have been several previous rounds of litigation before this Court in connection with the selection process that was initiated for appointment of a distributor at Assam More, Jalpaiguri pursuant to vacancy notice dated February 8, 2006. The order dated May 16, 2012 referred to in the impugned order was passed in connection with MAT 598 of 2012, being a writ appeal preferred by the petitioner in W.P. 17936 (W) of 2013 (hereafter Rajesh). In such appeal, the petitioner in W.P. 18371(W) of 2013 (hereafter Sunil) was the first respondent whereas the State and the officers of the Food and Supplies Department were the other respondents. The operative part of the order dated May 16, 2012 is quoted below:

(2.) The Director by an order dated August 07, 2012 had appointed Jamini Kumar Baidya, Officer-on- Special Duty and ex-officio Joint Director, District Distribution, Procurement and Supply (hereafter the OSD) for an on spot enquiry on the status of the competing candidates for appointment as Distributor for the subject vacancy. It appears from the report dated November 30, 2012 of the OSD that an enquiry was conducted on November 21, 2012 and a proforma report of each candidate on the factual position of godown alongwith other allied matters was prepared whereupon signature of both Rajesh and Sunil were obtained as a mark of their knowledge of the contents of enquiry. It further appears that one of the three competing candidates, Jugal Kishore Shanghai (hereafter Jugal) was not present during the enquiry and on local enquiry it was revealed that the godown proposed by him presently was not under his possession. The enquiry report also contained "points of anomalies" insofar as Rajesh and Sunil are concerned. It would be proper to set out from the report of the OSD the points of anomalies found by him, reading as follows:

(3.) The last two paragraphs of the report have a bearing on the issue raised in these two writ petitions and, therefore, are set out below: