Judicial review of educational assessments limited; courts uphold expert findings unless clear errors exist.

JUDGMENT

Rajiv Shakdher, J. (Oral)

[Court hearing convened via video-conferencing on account of COVID-19]

1. This writ petition is directed against the order dated 16.06.2021, passed by the Central Administrative Tribunal (in short `the Tribunal') in OA No. 1064/2021.

1.1. The Tribunal, via the impugned judgment, has dismissed the original application filed by the petitioner.

2. Being aggrieved, the petitioner has approached this Court.

3. The backdrop in which this writ petition has been filed is, broadly, as follows:

3.1. The petitioner had applied for selection to the post of Trained Graduate Teacher (Computer Science) [hereafter referred as `TGT (Computer Science)'] in Directorate of Education, Government of NCT of Delhi, against an advertisement issued by respondent no.1/DSSSB in 2014.

3.2. Consequent thereto, a written test was conducted on 21.05.2017. The petitioner secured 68 marks, whereas under the OBC category the cut off was pegged at 68.5 which is the category in which the petitioner had filed her application.

3.3. At this point, it is important to note that the present writ action arises from a second round of litigation initiated by the petitioner before the Tribunal. In the first instance, she approached the Tribunal, via OA No. 2401/2017.

3.4. To begin with, the petitioner was not satisfied with answers to several questions, as provided in the draft answer key, and finally, before the Tribunal, the challenge got narrowed down to answers to Question nos.102 and 183. The Tribunal, via order dated 03.12.2020, while disposing of the said OA, had ordered revaluation of question nos.102 and 183, by a different expert i.e. other than the expert who had framed the paper in the first instance.

3.5. The result of the revaluation exercise carried out by the new expert revealed that, the answers to the two question i.e. Question nos. 102 and 183 remained the same. In other words, the new expert and the examiner/expert who had initially prepared the question paper, did not vary.

3.6. It is in this background that the Tribunal did not grant any relief, when the petitioner approached it for the second time.

4. The instant writ petition was moved, for the first time, before this Court, on 09.07.2021, at which point of time we had asked Mr. Harpreet Singh, counsel for the petitioner, as to whether the petitioner's grievance was confined to question nos. 102 and 183? Mr. Singh had affirmed that position.

4.1. At that point in time i.e. 09.07.2021, the issue, which came to fore, was: whether the petitioner should be given access to the report of the expert, who was appointed pursuant to the order of the Tribunal dated 03.12.2020, passed in OA No.2401/2017.

4.2. Mr. Harpreet Singh, in support of his contention that access ought to be given to the petitioner, had relied upon the judgment of the Supreme Court, passed in Civil Appeal Nos. 4695-4699/2018, titled Rishal & Ors. vs. Rajasthan Public Service Commission & Ors..

4.3. We had examined the aforementioned judgment on that date, and agreed with Mr. Singh that access ought to be granted to the report of the experts [although, after redacting the names of the experts in order to protect their identity, as noticed on 09.07.2021]. Consequently, the matter was directed to be listed on 16.07.2021.

4.4. On 16.07.2021, Ms. Avnish Ahlawat, who appears for the respondents, indicated to us that, she will place the two reports, which were prepared by the experts, referred to hereinabove, in a sealed cover, for perusal of this Court.

4.5. Furthermore, Ms. Ahlawat had also submitted that the judgment of the Supreme Court in Rishal & Ors. case (supra) had been considered in a later ju