Harsimranjit Kaur v. Punjab Public Service Commission, Patiala

Mr. Suvir Sehgal, Additional Advocate General, Punjab for the respondent.

2. To be referred to the Reporters or not? Whether the judgment should be reported in the Digest? M.M.KUMAR, J. This order shall dispose of Letters Patent Appeal Nos. 1738 and 1745 of 2010 as both these appeals have arisen out of a common order dated 13.12.2010 passed by the learned Single Judge. which is the subject matter of challenge in these appeals preferred by the appellant-writ petitioners who are the candidates for taking Preliminary Test of entry in the Punjab Civil Services ( Executive Branch) Examinations, which was slated to be held on 19.12.2010. The appellant-writ petitioners approached this Court by filing different petitions and made the grievance that they were eligible in all respects and accordingly, they filed their application in respect to advertisement dated 26.11.2009 (P-1) before the expiry of the last Letters Patent Appeal No. 1738 of 2010 (O&M) 2 date. The Punjab Public Service Commission, Patiala (for brevity, `the Commission') issued a list of ineligible candidates, which was duly published in its official website, which included the Application Form No. sent by the appellant-writ petitioners. A public notice was also issued through newspaper and on the official website informing the candidates that if any of the candidates have any representation to make regarding their ineligibility, they may do so in writing addressed to the Commission by 31.8.2010. In pursuance to the aforesaid notice, the appellant-writ petitioners filed representation on 04.8.2010 (P-4). The only defect pointed out in their application form was that the appellant-writ petitioners had not signed the declaration in the application form and consequently, they were shown as ineligible in the list published by the Commission. The learned Single Judge dismissed the writ petition by observing that non-signing of declaration could not be considered mere an error and the Commission was within its right to reject the representation made by the appellant-writ petitioners. The view of the learned Single Judge is discernible from a perusal of paras 23 and 24 of the judgment, which read as under: “23. In regard to the ineligibility conditions to which the attention of the Court has been drawn, as extracted above, I am of the view that although Form provided the ineligibility conditions however, the respondents are within the bounds of their power to reject a representation in case the defect in filling the Form is fatal in nature. While the Forms of other candidates with minor errors could be considered, in the case of petitioner(s), they would have to be called to the office of Punjab Public Letters Patent Appeal No. 1738 of 2010 (O&M) 3 Service Commission to sign the declaration clause. There has to be a terminus to every process. If, all defects are allowed to be cured, the process would take infinite time in satisfying all the candidates who have committed errors.” “24. In my opinion , it was required for the respondents to consider representation(s) of the petitioner(s) in a relevant context, objectively. I am of the view that respondents have done the exercise in a positive way, therefore, no reason for judicially reviewing the action of the respondents on the administrative side is made out. The petitioners were expected to fill the Application Form (s) correctly. Admittedly, it was an error committed by the petitioner(s) in not signing the Declaration. The respondents gave an opportunity to represent so that the issue could be reconsidered. The respondents have reconsidered the issue and have found the error committed by the petitioner(s) to be fatal in nature thereby rendering the petitioner(s) ineligible to take preliminary examination for selection to Punjab Civil Services (Executive Branch). In such circumstances, I find that the petitioners do not have any substantive right to invoke extraordinary writ jurisdiction. The argument addressed on behalf of the petitioner(s) that the publication of public notice gives a right to the petitioner(s) for correcting the errors, can not be accepted to mean that any and every defect in filling the Application Form would be corrected by the candidates. Surely, the respondents have the Letters Patent Appeal No. 1738 of 2010 (O&M) 4 discretion, which in my opinion, has been exercised objectively, to reject the representations in case the defect in filling the Application Form (s) is of serious nature.” Mr. Rajiv Narain Raina and Mr.S.K.Garg Narwana, learned counsel for the appellants have argued that non-signing of declaration by the appellant-writ petitioners is a curable lapse and it would not amount to snatching away their right of appearing in the examination. According to the learned counsel, once the Commission has issued a public notice inviting representation in respect of ineligibility of the candidates after displaying their details, then it could not have rejected their request for curing the defect. Mr. Suvir Sehgal, learned Additional Advocate General, Punjab, has, however, argued that there has to be finality attached to the procedure of accepting examination form and it can not be kept open for all times to come. According to the learned counsel, the appellant-writ petitioners have already appeared in the examination held on 19.12.2010 and in fact, no further direction would be necessary and their result would be declared as per their merit. After hearing learned counsel for the parties and keeping in view the fact that the appellant-writ petitioners have already taken examination on 19.12.2010 by participating in the Preliminary Examination of the Punjab Civil Services (Executive Branch), no further direction would be required to be issued as stated by the learned Additional Advocate General. We, however, wish to make it clear that once the commission has invited representation by publishing a public notice on its official website as well as in the newspaper, then trivial lapses should have been rectified, including the lapse of signing the declaration, particularly when the lapse has Letters Patent Appeal No. 1738 of 2010 (O&M) 5 been detected by the Commission. Even the Commission has granted one opportunity to the candidates for rectification of the same, particularly when it has invited representation for the aforesaid purpose. Therefore, we dispose of both the appeals having been rendered infructuous as per the statement made by the learned State counsel and the judgment of the learned Single Judge is set aside. A photo copy of this order be placed on the file of connected appeal. ( M.M.KUMAR ) JUDGE ( RITU BAHRI ) JUDGE

21.12.2010