JUDGMENT :

Hiranmay Bhattacharyya, J.

1. The judgment dated 29th November, 2023 passed by the Central Administrative Tribunal, Kolkata, Circuit Bench at Port Blair (for short “the Tribunal”) is under challenge in this application under Article 226 of the Constitution of India at the instance of the original applicant in OA 351/01913/2018/AN.

2. The original applicant/petitioner herein applied for the post of Craft Teacher under the Department of Education, Andaman & Nicobar Administration in response to a vacancy notice issued by the respondent Administration on April 20, 2015. Out of total 43 posts of teachers, 10 posts were for Tailoring and Embroidery Teachers. Out of the said 10 posts 3 posts were reserved for Other Backward Class category, 3 posts were reserved for Schedule Tribe category and 4 posts were under the unreserved (General) category. The petitioner belongs to general category. She qualified in the selection test and claims to have been placed in the third position in the unreserved general category in the provisional list published by the respondent Administration. Subsequently, the petitioner came to know that she was placed in the fourth position after revision of marks. The petitioner further allege that the respondent Administration has changed the breakup of vacancies by reducing the vacancy for Craft Instructor (Tailoring and Embroidery) in general category from four to three.

3. The petitioner alleged that the respondent authorities acted arbitrarily by extending the benefit of appointment in favour of Other Backward Class candidate by keeping the petitioner in the waiting list.

4. Being aggrieved by the decision of the respondent Administration to reduce the number of vacancies in the unreserved category from four to three resulting in her elimination from the list of selected candidates, the petitioner filed the original application before the learned Tribunal.

5. The respondent contested the original application by filing a Reply before the learned Tribunal. The stand of the respondent in the said reply was that the Personnel Department of the Andaman & Nicobar Administration examined the vacancy position and suggested that the vacancy notice dated 20th May, 2015 published by the Education Department is required to be modified in terms of paragraph nos. 31.5, 31.6 and 31.7 of DoP&T’s OM dated 25th June, 2010 and the vacancy position was modified accordingly. It was further stated in the said reply that one post each from the Tailoring and Embroidery, Bamboo and Cane Work, Computer Application and Wood Craft and Carpenter trade were allocated from unreserved category to Other Backward class.

6. In the rejoinder to the reply the petitioner contended that when the vacancy notice has been published the authorities do not have any right to change the vacancy position. It was also stated in the said rejoinder that clause 17 of the vacancy notice cannot be used by the authorities to change the vacancy position category wise.

7. The learned Tribunal, by the judgment and order dated 29th November, 2023, dismissed the Original Application upon holding that there is no legal infirmity in the action of the respondents in modifying the category wise breakup of vacancies subsequent to the publication of the vacancy notice.

8. Being aggrieved, the original applicant has approached this court.

9. Mrs. Nag, learned counsel appearing in support of the petition contended that the action of the respondent Administration in revising the vacancy position after issuance of the recruitment notice amounts to changing the rules of the game after commencement of the selection process which is impermissible. She further contended that the revision of vacancies is in violation of the constitutional provisions inasmuch as more than 50 percent of the posts were earmarked for reserved categories. She further contended that the number of vacancy of the Other Backward Class category was increased from three to four with the malafide