JUDGMENT :

(Harish Tandon, J.)

The instant writ petition is filed assailing the judgment and order dated 28th February, 2022 passed by the West Bengal Administrative Tribunal in OA No. 170 of 2021 whereby and whereunder the said tribunal application was dismissed.

2. As many as 582 persons have joined together and filed the instant writ petition challenging the aforesaid order of the Tribunal on various grounds. It is undisputed that the aforesaid writ petitioners though participated in the selection process but were not included in the list of the successful candidates and thereafter approached the Tribunal by filing OA No. 170 of 2021 challenging the entire selection process.

3. All the writ petitioners belong to a different categories like Unreserved category, SC category, ST category, OBC-A and OBC-B category and the Sportsman category and applied their candidature in pursuance of the advertisement no. 15/2018 uploaded on the Website of the Public Service Commission on 13.6.2018 for the post of Fire Fighter in the West Bengal Fire Services under the Department of Fire and Emergency Services, Government of West Bengal. The total vacancies for the said post was declared as 1452 and the breakup whereof was also indicated in the said advertisement relating to Unreserved category, SC category, ST category, OBC-A category, OBC-B category, Ex-serviceman and Meritorious Sportsperson category. The essential qualification enshrined in the said advertisement includes the minimum educational qualification to be Madhyamik pass or its equivalent and the physical test, the endurance test. The desirable qualifications mentioned therein requires a certificate from an industrial training institute in any of the following discipline namely, Civil Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Automobile Engineering and Swimming certificate from any Government recognized club or the institute.

4. Basically the examination was indicated to be held on the basis of the written examination, the physical measurement test and endurance and personality test. The written test was earmarked for 80 marks and the list was published in the first week of September, 2019 indicating the candidates provisionally qualified for physical measurement/endurance test without disclosing the marks obtained by each of such candidates in the written test. It is averred in the said application that the said list does not contain any decision of the PSC on the cut-off marks/qualifying marks of the written test. After the physical measurement/endurance test, a list of 5375 candidates were published without disclosing the marks obtained by such candidates therein nor any cut-off marks was declared by the conducting authority. The said list was published disclosing the roll numbers of the aforesaid candidates who have qualified for interview and the name of the writ petitioners were also included in the said list and they appeared therein.

5. The moment the writ petitioners did not find their names in the final list published by the Public Service Commission (for short, ‘PSC’) it raises a doubt in their mind that the said recruitment process has not been conducted in a fair manner. The Tribunal application further proceeds that despite their efforts having made to access the Official Website of the PSC they could not find their individual marks to