Excelsior Correspondent
SRINAGAR, Apr 18: The High Court today kept the process of selection for the posts of 42 Civil Judges (Munsiff) undertaken by the Public Service Commission (PSC) intact by dismissing the pleas of the aggrieved candidates with the option to them to seek remedy by approaching the Supreme Court.
The three petitions were filed against the process of selection undertaken by the PSC for filling up of 42 posts of Civil Judges as also the list of candidates declared to have qualified for the admission to viva voce by the PSC for the posts in question.
Two petitions were dismissed by the Division Bench of Justice Ali Mohammad Magrey and Justice Mohan Lal by recording that none of the rights of the petitioners have been violated and held that the petitions are without any merit, unnecessary.
The DB said since one post of Civil Judge (Junior Division)/Munsiff remains unfilled, High Court must have an interest in getting it filled immediately. The court therefore asked the Registrar General, High Court to make an endeavor to immediately file its response before the Supreme Court bringing the relevant facts to the notice of the Apex Court so that the matter is settled there. “We would also leave the petitioner(s) herein, if they so desire, free to seek remedy from the Supreme Court, if any, available to them under law”, court said
The candidate in one of the writ petitions is aggrieved of his non-inclusion in the select list as an Open Merit candidate belonging to Physically Handicapped Category (OM/PHC) and the other aggrieved candidate submitted that he belonged to RBA category and physically disabled person, suffering from 40 % permanent visual disability and had offered his candidature for the post of Civil Judge (Junior Division)/Munsiff pursuant to advertisement Notification.
He is aggrieved of notification no.PSC/Exam/65/2019 dated 06.09.2019 whereby the Commission released the post earlier reserved by it in RBA category for PHC candidates and selected/recommended the RBA candidate, for appointment against the post.
The DB said that the Court would not be interested in knowing who amongst the two OM/PHC candidates has actually secured the highest marks and allowed the third petition to the extent that the Commission would be obliged to declare the result of the PHC candidates and proceed with the finalization of the selection process.
“But, again, such a direction cannot be made at this stage in view of pendency of the aforesaid SLP before the Supreme Court which, in view of the decision rendered by the Division Bench of this Court on account of the ignorance of the concerned counsel in not bringing to the notice of the DB the material and relevant facts and judgment of the Supreme Court. This Court has to await the Supreme Court decision in the SLP”, the DB said.
The Commission, in their reply to these petitions have stated that on the basis of 3% horizontal reservation for physically disabled candidates, the total number of vacancies being 42, the number of posts allocable to the said category would work out to 1.26, rounding to one post.
Commission further submitted that since there were three candidates in the PHC category, the Commission approved that all the three PHC candidates who had appeared in the written examination be summoned for viva voce which was conducted on 24.08.2019 and there was only one post allocable to PHC candidates. Since the PHC candidates in the fray belonged to both OM (02 candidates) and RBA category (01 candidate), therefore, one candidate in each category, i.e. OM and RBA, was displaced from the general selection list and the resultant post was kept withheld/reserved for the PHC candidate in the OM and RBA category.
Commission stated that after the interview, the merit position of the said candidates became clear, as such, the Commission, in its meeting held on 06.09.2019, approved to release the said post in RBA category as the PHC candidate who secured highest marks belonged to OM.
However, the result of the PHC candidate in the OM has been withheld in terms of the Court orders. It is further stated that there is no mention of preference to low vision candidates in Reservation Rules over other PHC sub-categories; therefore, the candidate having the highest merit amongst the PHC candidates is to be selected.
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