The principle of merit must prevail in filling unreserved vacancies for Persons with Disabilities, allowing the appointment of meritorious candidates from any reserved category when more qualified than available unreserved candidates.

JUDGMENT :

NONGMEIKAPAM KOTISWAR SINGH, J.

1. The present appeal has been preferred against the judgment and order dated 07.05.2024 passed by the Division Bench of the High Court at Calcutta in MAT 69/2024 with CAN 1 of 2024, whereby the order passed by the Single Bench in WPA 26312/2023 was set aside.

2. The core issue involved in this appeal relates to the manner of filling of a vacancy reserved for Person with Disability with Low Vision (PWD-LV) in the Unreserved category UR (PWD-LV)¹ [UR (PWD-LV): Unreserved (Persons with Disabilities - Low Vision or Blindness)] where the recruitment notification stipulated that in case of non-availability of qualified unreserved candidate in the PWD-LV category, the vacancy will be filled up by PWD candidates of other categories as per merit.

3. By the impugned order, the Division Bench of the Calcutta High Court held that when a qualified unreserved PWD-LV candidate is available, the vacancy is to be filled up by the qualified unreserved candidate only, even though there may be more meritorious PWD-LV candidates available in the reserved category of OBC-A, as per of the aforesaid stipulation in the recruitment notification.

4. In order to appreciate this issue involved, a brief reference to the relevant facts would be apposite.

5. A recruitment process was initiated by the Appellant, West Bengal State Electricity Transmission Co. Ltd., for appointment to a number of posts vide Notification No. REC/2023/01.

The said notification includes 30 vacancies for the post of Junior Engineer (Civil) Grade II, out of which 1 (one) post was meant for unreserved UR (PWD-LV) and 5 (five) posts for Other Backward Classes-A (OBC-A)² [OBC-A: Other Backward Class (Most Backward)] as follows:

There are also two notes below the table as follows:

*In case of non-availability of qualified UR (PWD-HH) candidate, the vacancy will be filled by PWD candidates of other categories as per merit.

*In case of non-availability of qualified UR (PWD-LV) candidate, the vacancy will be filled by PWD candidates of other categories as per merit.

6. The aforesaid advertisement shows that while certain number of posts are reserved under various social categories (vertical), there are reservations for special categories (horizontal) for these social categories also, that is, reservation within reservation.

Thus, 7 (seven) posts have been earmarked for the Unreserved Category, and further, in the same Unreserved Category, 4 (four) posts have been reserved for the special category of EC³ [EC: Exempted Category] and 1 (one) post each has been reserved for the special categories of Ex-S⁴ [Ex-S: Ex-Servicemen], MS⁵ [MS: Meritorious Sportspersons] and PWD-LV.

In respect of the social reservation (vertical) category of OBC, it has been further sub-categorised into OBC-A and OBC-B, and horizontal reservations have also been provided for these two sub-categories.

Similarly, there are special (horizontal) reservations in respect of SCs and STs, with which we are not concerned in this case.

7. Thus, the aforesaid notification indicates both vertical and horizontal reservations.

The horizontal reservation pattern in the aforesaid not