Deepak Gupta, J.

1. By means of this writ petition, the Petitioners have challenged the constitutional validity of Rule 7 of the Chhattisgarh Public Service Commission Rules of Procedure (for short 'the Rules') which reads as follows:

"7. Minimum qualifying score for written examination, skill examination or screening examination.- Candidates of the unreserved and unreserved subcategory must obtain at least 33 percent marks in every question paper and in any written/skill/screening examination, otherwise he/she will be disqualified and taken off the remaining process of selection. Thus for unreserved category and unreserved sub-category, question paper wise minimum qualifying marks shall be 33 percent of the total marks assigned for the question paper.

Candidates of the reserved category and reserved subcategory must obtain at least 23 percent marks in every question paper in any written/skill/screening examination, otherwise he/she will be disqualified and taken off the remaining process of selection. Thus for reserved category and reserved sub-category candidates, question paper wise minimum qualifying marks shall be 23 percent of the total marks assigned for the question paper.

Where there is provision of scaling of marks obtained in examination, there question paper wise non scaled/raw marks means actual marks obtained will be used for fixing eligibility criteria."

2. Admittedly, the Petitioners belongs to the general category. They are, however disabled person and have sought employment under the State Civil Services Examination as a general category candidate belonging to the physically handicapped category. There is reservation in the State of Chhattisgarh wherein 32% seats are reserved for Scheduled Tribes (for short 'the ST'), 16% seats for Scheduled Castes (for short 'the SC') and 10% seats for Other Backward Class category (for short 'the OBC'). Rest of the seats are open category seats. This is the vertical reservation.

3. There is horizontal reservation also and cutting across all the three reserved categories, 3% seats are reserved for the physically handicapped candidates as per the Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, 1995 (hereinafter called 'the Act'). The reservation for persons with disabilities cuts across other three reserved categories i.e. SC, ST and OBC and is applicable in amongst all the reserved categories also.

4. The Chhattisgarh Public Service Commission has laid down two benchmarks for a candidate to be declared as successful. For general category candidate, the pass percentage is 33% marks whereas for a candidate belonging to the reserved category, the pass percentage is 23%. The claim of the Petitioners is that they also belongs to the reserved sub-category i.e. the category of physically handicapped and therefore they should be given this benefit of lower pass marks of 23%.

5. The Petitioner No. 1, in this behalf had filed Writ Petition (S) No. 2188 of 2016 in which she had claimed that as per the Rules, she was entitled to reservation. This prayer was rejected by the by the learned Single Judge vide order dated 11.07.2016. However, the learned Single Judge gave liberty to the Petitioner No. 1 to challenge the validity of the Rules. Therefore, the Petitioner No. 1 has accepted the judgment of the learned Single Judge that as per the Rules, she is not entitled to any higher marks. However, now the Petitioners have challenged the validity of the Rules on the ground that they are discriminatory and discriminate between disabled sub-category and other reserved categories.

6. We are not at all impressed with this argument. The disabled persons are in a totally different class as compared to the persons belonging to reserved categories of SC, ST or OBC. The reservation made for SC, ST or OBC has its legal basis in Article 15 and 16 of the Constitution of India. The reservation for disabled persons is not as per the Constitution but as pe