JUDGMENT :

L. NAGESWARA RAO, J.

Leave granted.

1. The Teachers Recruitment Board (hereinafter referred to as the ‘Board’) issued a notification on 28.07.2017 inviting applications for selection to the posts of Lecturers in Government Polytechnic Colleges in the State of Tamil Nadu for the year 2017-2018. 1058 vacancies were notified and 1,70,366 applications were received. A written examination was conducted on 16.09.2017 in which 1,33,567 candidates appeared.

2. The written examination was of objective type. A printed book was given to the candidates in the examination hall. The printed book is known as Optical Mark Recognition (OMR) sheet. After completion of the written examination, the OMR sheets were scanned in the office of the Board. The original OMR answer sheets were kept in the safe custody in the office of the Board.

3. The scanned copies of the OMR sheets were sent to M/s Datatech Methodex Pvt. Ltd., New Delhi (hereinafter referred to as the ‘Agency’) for evaluation and for preparation of the final list of the candidates who qualified for the certificate verification. The evaluation was done by the Agency and the list was sent to the Board. The merit list of the candidates c