ASHA MEHTA Vs. STATE OF PUNJAB

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The petitioner is a graduate in Law in first division. She obtained the LL.B. degree from Punjabi University, Patiala in the examination held in July, 1990. The Punjab Public Service Commission (in short the Commission) issued advertisement No. 8 in the Daily Tribune of Sept. 8, 1990 inviting applications for recruitment to 52 posts of Punjab Civil Service (Judicial Branch). Twenty six posts were meant for general category candidates and the rest of the posts were reserved for various categories. The recruitment and appointment to the Punjab Civil Service (Judicial Branch) is governed by the statutory rules known as Punjab Civil Service (Judicial Branch) Rules, 1951 (hereinafter called the Rules). Under the Rules a candidate is required to sit in a written test comprising of five papers. Four papers are of 200 marks each whereas 5th paper of language is of 100 marks. A candidate qualifying in the written examination is called for a viva voce test which is of 100 marks. Rule 7 of the Rules provides that no candidate shall be credited with any marks in any paper unless he obtains at least 33% marks in it and no candidate is to be called for the viva voce test unless he obtains at least 50% marks in the aggregate of all the written papers. He is also required to get at least 33% marks in the language paper. Rule 8 of the Rules provides that the merit of the qualified candidates shall be determined by the Commission according to the aggregate marks obtained in the written papers and viva voce. For ready reference Rules 7 and 8 as amended upto date and applicable in the present case are reproduced as below:-

(2.) The petitioner appeared in the examination held by the Commission in April, 1991 but when the result was declared, she was shown unsuccessful. The petitioner apprehended that her answer books had been mixed up with some other candidate's answer books, as she could not imagine that she would not secure 33% marks in each paper and 50% marks in the aggregate. She filed a writ petition in this Court (Civil Writ Petition No. 12944 of 1991) on 19.8.1991. The Motion Bench summoned the answer books of the petitioner which were shown to the petitioner as well and after satisfying that there was no mixing up of the answer books, the writ petition was dismissed on 27.8.1991. The petitioner on perusal of the answer books came to know that in the English paper, which consists of writing an essay, she had obtained only 65 marks out of 200 marks. In accordance with Rule 7(1) of the Rules ibid these 65 marks were not credited in favour of the petitioner as according to the Commission a candidate was required to get at least 33% marks i.e. 66 marks out of 200 marks to get credit of the marks. The petitioner filed the present writ petition claiming that in fact 32.5% marks obtained in the English paper should be rounded off to 33% and credit of these marks of the English paper should be given to her and the respondents be directed to take viva voce test of the petitioner and then consider her case for appointment on merit. It may be observed that there is no Rule or any instruction issued by the Commission that in case the marks are up to a fraction of .5% or above the same are to be rounded off to the next figure. For example a candidate obtaining 32.5% marks is deemed to have got 33% by rounding off the figure of 32.5% to 33%. The learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that at the time of motion hearing it was brought to the notice of the Court that the Commission for recruitment to other services like lecturers in Colleges is following the principles of rounding off i.e. 49.5% are treated as 50%. He had also shown a copy of an advertisement to the Motion Bench, whereby the posts of lecturers had been advertised and it was mentioned that 49.5% of higher fraction of percentage of marks in the qualifying examination would be rounded off to 50%. The learned counsel has placed a copy of the advertisement on the file of the case. The counsel for the petitioner submitted that there cannot be any rationale in rounding off the percentage of marks in case of a particular post and not doing the same thing for the posts in P.C.S. (Judicial Branch). It has been averred in the petition that Punjab Public Service Commission in case of appointments of College Lecturers has been rounding off 49.5% and 54.5% marks to 50% and 55% respectively.

(3.) To get the matter clarified from the Commission as to why and under what circumstances the percentage of marks for the post of Lecturers was being rounded off, I passed an order on Jan. 27, 1993 asking the Commission to file an additional affidavit clarifying the points mentioned in the order which are reproduced below:-