Anju Bala v. Haryana State And Others
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% "# " :# ; ! # # "This order of ours will dispose of C.W.P. No. 8187 of 1990 as well as C.W.P. No. 12206 of 1990.
The facts which are not in dispute, in brief are that the Subordinate Services Selection Board, Haryana (hereinafter called the Board), advertised a huge number of posts of Clerks to be appointed in various Departments of Haryana. The requisition of the posts of Clerks in the various Departments of Haryana was more than 1000. A joint written test was taken by the Board and one merit list was prepared by the Board. The names of the selected candidates were recommended for appointment in different Departments of Haryana against the posts of Clerks as per the requisition made by each department.
Somehow it so happened that the candidates, who were recommended by the Board for being appointed in a particular department were not given appointments for various reasons, like there no requirement of the filling of the posts at the relevant time or/for some reasons the posts were not available etc. The end result of this was that candidates who were lower in merit and were recommended for appointment in a particular department got appointments, whereas the candidates who were higher in merit and recommended for appointment in another department, did not get appointments at all. In other words, candidates lower in merit got the appointments; whereas the candidates higher in merit did not get the appointments, though their names were recommended by the Board for being appointed by a particular department.
The grievance of the petitioners is that while giving appointments, petitioners who were higher in merit have been ignored, while candidates lower in merit have got appointments. The learned counsel for the petitioners
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submitted that this was a clear violation of Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India. On the other hand, the stand of the respondentBoard is that the Board had recommended the names of the candidates to various departments strictly in accordance with merit and it is for the department to make appointments, as the Board is not the appointing Authority, but is only a recommending Authority. According to the learned counsel for the respondents, the Board is not at fault at all and if a certain department does not give appointments, the Board cannot be blamed for that.
It has not been denied that the candidates lower in merit have been appointed by the other departments; whereas the petitioners who were higher in merit have not been given appointments by the department where the names of the petitioners were recommended and their names have been sent back to the Board. It has been further pleaded by the Board in its written statement that the names of the persons which have been received back and could not be appointed by various departments on account of one reason or the other, such names would be again sent for appointment as per their original merit as and when any requisition is received by the Board subject to any decision of the Government regarding the validity of the existing selection list.
It has been further stated that different departments have different qualifications for the post of Clerk and sometimes the person whose name is recommended for appointment does not have the requisite qualification and that is why he is not given appointment by the concerned department.
After hearing the learned counsel for the parties, we are of the view that there is merit in the submissions of the learned counsel for the petitioners. There is no denying the fact that the Board is the sole and single recruiting agency of the State for the posts of clerks and other such like posts falling within the purview of the Board. The various departments send the requisition for the posts of Clerks as per their requirement and the Board makes one joint selection as was done in the present case. Once there is a joint selection and one common merit is prepared, certainly the person higher in merit has a prior right of appointment than the person lower in merit. The appointments have to adhere to and in accordance with the merit list strictly.
For no fault of persons like the Petitioners who are higher in merit and happened to be recommended to a particular department where for one reason or the other they were not given appointments can be made to suffer. This cannot deprive them of their right of being appointed in the other departments on the basis of higher merit.
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have come back. If that is not done, it will be a clear violation of the provisions of Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India.
It is true that the Board sends recommendations according to the requisitions which it had received that between the sending of the requisition and actual selection and recommending the candidates quite a bit of time lapses and when the recommendations are sent at that moment there is no requirement of as many posts in a particular department for which earlier on it had sent its requisition. That is why this problem arises because the persons who are higher in merit do not get appointments as their names come back. It would be appropriate if before sending recommendations to each department, the Board was to ask the department at that particular time as to how many posts that department wanted to fill so that the same number of candidates can be recommended by the Board to that particular department. That would avoid the present situation in which the petitioners have been put in.
By directing the Board at this stage to recommend the names of the petitioners and other similarly situated persons who are higher in merit and whose names have been received back from the departments as they could not be appointed, would at this juncture disturb the persons who have already been appointed in the other departments, though lower in merit. We would not like to disturb such persons who have been appointed in the other departments who are lower in merit. Under the circumstances, we direct that from now onwards whenever a requisition is received from any department for filling the posts of Clerks, all persons who are higher in merit as compared to the last person who might have been appointed as a Clerk, till today on the basis of the merit prepared on 15th October, 1989, shall be appointed first.
Till such persons who are higher in merit are appointed, the selection list prepared on 15th October, 1989 would not lapse irrespective of any instructions to the contrary issued by the State of Haryana, if any. This direction is in consonance with the Haryana Government instructions issued by the Chief Secretary vide letter No. 2637SOS176/12144 dated 17th May, 1978. in which it has been observed as under: "The Government has also decided that if the name of any candidate has been recommended by the Subordinate Services Selection Board for appointment to any department and the department fails to appoint him for any reason, the validity of the names of such candidates will never lapse and the recommendation of such candidates can be made to any other department at any time by the Subordinate Services Selection Board."
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Before parting with the order, we may also deal with a point raised by the learned counsel for the respondent that there are different qualifications for the posts of Clerks in different departments. The learned counsel for the petitioners in C.W.P. No. 12206 of 1990 drew our attention to the Government instructions dated 17th May, 1978 (Annexure P 3), wherein it is mentioned that the qualifications for the post like Clerks by all departments should be similar and that whenever requisition from the departments to fill up posts for common categories, is received by the Board, the demands of the departments may be consolidated and a common advertisement may be issued and it should be mentioned that these posts pertain to different departments.
Further, it has been mentioned that a joint seniority list of successful candidates be prepared according to the merit of the candidates. From the above, it is clear that the qualifications for the posts of Clerks in different departments had to be the same and further it is evident that one joint test/interview for all posts in different departments had to be carried out and a joint merit list prepared. This has in fact been done in the present case. Under the circumstances, it cannot be said that the persons who were on the merit list were not qualified to be appointed in any of the departments.
The writ petitions are allowed and the respondent Board is directed to make further appointment of Clerks in accordance with the observations made above. No costs." <
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