MANBIR SINGH Vs. STATE OF J&K AND ORS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The present appeal is directed against the judgment dated 13.03.2007 of a learned Single Judge of this Court in SWP No.664/2002. The plea of the petitioner/appellant is that he is a physically handicapped person and suffers from locomotor disability of 80%. Pursuant to the Notification No.01 of 1999 dated 09.03.1999 issued by the official respondents, the petitioner/appellant along with others applied for the posts of Teachers in District Kathua. He is aggrieved by the fact that he was not selected and appointed. The main ground for his being aggrieved is that according to him, as stated in the writ petition, persons of lesser merit and disability had been appointed, whereas he was ignored.

(2.) Without getting into great detail, it is to be noted that three persons were selected in the handicapped category (Orthopedic). The merit position of the three candidates in this category was as under:-

(3.) Insofar as the petitioner/appellant is concerned, he had obtained 30.06 points under the same category. These facts are admitted. It is, therefore, evident that, on merits, the petitioner had no case. The last such person to be selected being respondent No.12 (Respondent No. 5 in this appeal) had obtained 47.44 points which is much higher than what the petitioner/appellant obtained i.e., 30.06 points. The plea that has now been taken in the present appeal is that the said respondent No.12 in the writ petition (respondent No.5 in the appeal) was not eligible for being considered inasmuch as it is alleged that his disability was less than 40%, which was the minimum eligibility condition. However, this point was not raised by the petitioner in the writ petition which was filed as far back as in 2002. It was not even raised in the course of arguments before the learned Single Judge and, obviously, no such argument has even been noticed in the impugned judgment. We also note that the respondent No.5 herein has been working as a Teacher since 2001-2002. In other words, he has been functioning as a Teacher for over 17 years. It would not be proper on the part of this Court to permit the petitioner/appellant to raise this point after such a long delay.