Point of Law : Appointment - If the petitioner was selected, she would have been in appropriate place in the roster. But, for the mistake of Respondent Nos. 2, she cannot be deprived of the benefits of service, and atleast notional seniority shall be given from the date of her juniors were appointed.

JUDGMENT :

M. Satyanarayana Murthy, J.

Aggrieved by the order passed by the learned single Judge in W.P.No.9827 of 2021 dated 06.10.2021, the petitioner - appellant preferred this writ appeal under Clause 15 of Letter Patent. The learned single Judge dismissed the writ petition, denying the relief of writ of mandamus, as the petitioner failed to submit her sub-caste certificate for verification within the stipulated time.

2. The appellant herein was the writ petitioner and the respondents herein were the respondents before the learned single Judge. They will hereinafter be referred as arrayed in W.P.No.9827 of 2021 for the sake of convenience.

3. The writ petitioner - Ms. Potluru Anjali filed the writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India, claiming the following relief:

“to issue a writ order or direction more particularly one in the Writ of Mandamus to declare the action of Respondent Nos. 2 to 5 in not selecting the petitioner as Secondary Grade Teacher by generating the Provisional Selection List to the post of SGT (TEL) under ST (Yanadi) in Prakasam District, duly placing her name above the petitioner above the name of Respondent No.6 as illegal, arbitrary and consequently direct the respondents to select the petitioner as Secondary Grade Teacher by issuing fresh provisional list to the post of SGT (TEL) under ST (Yanadi) in Prakasam District, duly placing the name of the petitioner above the name of Respondent No.6, pursuant to Memo No.ESE02- 20022/66/2020-RECTMT-CSE dated 21.01.2021 issued by the second respondent with all consequential benefits.”

4. The first respondent vide G.O.Ms.No.67 dated 26.10.2018 issued Scheme of Selection Rules for Teacher Eligibility Test-cum-Teacher Recruitment Test (TET-cum-TRT). The petitioner appeared for online examination, secured Rank No.3,726, whereas, Respondent No.6 secured 3,916 and Respondent No.7 secured Rank No.4,412. Subsequently, the respondents displayed provisional selection list (Phase-I), but the name of the petitioner and names of Respondent Nos. 6 & 7 were not found in Phase-I List. Later, the respondents published provisional selection list SGT (Phase-II) and in the said list, the names of Respondent Nos. 6 & 7 were found. Even though, the petitioner secured better rank, her name was not found. The same provisional list was repeated for another five times, even when the official respondents published the provisional selection. The official respondents informed that Scheduled Tribe (Yanadi) and Scheduled Tribe (Chenchu) candidates are eligible for selection in the schools of Tribal non-scheduled areas in Ashram schools in Prakasam District. As no column is provided in online application specifying the sub-caste of schedule tribe candidates, the IT cell which is under the control of the second respondent sent message to all the Scheduled Tribe candidates instructing them to submit the sub-caste certificate through online except to the petitioner. Since the petitioner did not submit the sub-caste certificate that she belongs to Schedule Tribe i.e. sub-caste (Yanadi), the respondents did not consider her candidature for selection, but Respondent Nos. 6 & 7 were considered even though they secured lesser marks than her. The petitioner submitted applications to Respondent Nos. 2 to 5 informing that she did not receive SMS for submitting the sub-caste certificate through online. The second respondent also directed the IT cell to generate the provisional selection list to the post of Secondary Grade Teacher (Telugu) under Scheduled Tribe (Yanadi) in Prakasam District duly considering petitioner’s Hall Ticket, Rank under Scheduled Tribe (Yanadi) Quota. The IT cell on verification found that, since the SMS was not being reached, they tried for eight times but they could not succeed. Therefore, the respondents should have made a phone call to her mobile phone numbe