1. This bunch of writ petitions are being decided by this common judgment inasmuch as same issues arise for determination in all these cases. Petitioners in all these cases were appointed as Lecturers, and working as probationers, with National Council for Cooperative Training (hereinafter referred to as respondent no.1/employer) when their services were terminated by the impugned orders. For the sake of convenience, facts referred to in this judgment are of W.P. (C) No.7289/2011. Impugned orders in the cases of all the petitioners are more or less the same, and the impugned order in W.P.(C) No.7289/2011 reads as under:-

“NCCT/2-7/Pers/2011 September 26, 2011

OFFICE ORDER

Department of Agriculture and Cooperation Ministry of Agriculture, govt. of India, conducted an enquiry into the process of recruitment and selection of the lecturers in NCCT, who had applied against the advertisement in the Employment News appeared in 2-8 October, 2010 and the enquiry committee has found that this has been done in violation of established procedure in this regard. Based on this DOAC has directed NCCT to cancel the whole process of the recruitment of these lecturers vide the letter No.A11011/5/2009-CET (Pt) Dated 29.07.2011. Accordingly, your appointment as lecturer at ICM, Jaipur is hereby cancelled with immediate effect. You are directed to collect dues if any on account of salary, allowances and any other benefits admissible to you as per rules. This issues with the approval of the competent authority.

Sd/-

(Dr. Dinesh)

Director General

To:

Lecturer Institute of Cooperative Management”

2. Petitioners were appointed as Lecturers with the respondent no.1/employer pursuant to their selection in the interviews conducted in terms of the advertisement dated 2.10.2010 issued in the Employment News. Petitioners were given offers of appointments and these appointments commenced with the petitioners starting as probationary officers for a period of two years. There were certain complaints (argued to be anonymous by the petitioners) with respect to gross illegalities in the selection process of the Lecturers, and consequently, a committee was appointed by the Department of Agriculture and Co-operation (DAC) of the Ministry of Agriculture vide its letter dated 16.5.2011 to conduct a detailed enquiry. The enquiry committee members were Mr. A. Mazumdar, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, Department of Agriculture and Co-operation (DAC), Mr. Sandeep Kumar, Under Secretary in the same Ministry and Department and Mr. Ghanshyan Thakur, Under Secretary again in the same Ministry and the Department. The enquiry team conducted a detailed enquiry, examined all the papers and looked into the records and gave its report which contained detailed findings and reasons. The enquiry committee has concluded that the entire selection process is vitiated, and therefore, should be cancelled. Hence the impugned letters were issued to the petitioners cancelling their appointments with the respondent no.1/employer during their probation periods.

3. The issue before this Court is whether the respondent no.1/employer could have cancelled the entire selection process. The related issue is that whether the selection process could have been cancelled without the petitioners being heard i.e whether the cancellation of the selection process was violative of the principles of audi alteram partem. The crux of the matter is that whether the selection process need not have been cancelled because, as argued by the petitioners, there could have taken place separation of the untainted candidates from the tainted ones.

4. Before discussing the Enquiry Report, let us examine as to what is the law in regard to cancellation of the selection process as a whole. Supreme Court in this regard has consistently held that if the examination/recruitment process is so tainted that