Eligibility criteria for employment do not require continuous service; contractual experience can be considered valid if it meets the total required experience.

JUDGMENT

Rekha Palli, J. (ORAL)

1. The petitioner, who was working as a Lower Division Clerk (LDC) in the respondent no. 1 organisation, has approached this Court being aggrieved by the order dated 11.03.2019 vide which the respondent no. 2 has been selected for appointment to the post of Upper Division Clerk (UDC) in preference to the petitioner.

2. The brief factual matrix as emerging from the record may be first noted. The respondent no.1 issued an advertisement in July, 2017 inviting applications for filling up the post of UDC. The petitioner and respondent no. 2 besides other candidates, being desirous of appointment to the said post, applied for the same as per the laid down procedure. It is an admitted case of the parties that the selection process for the said post involved three stages. The first being an objective test which was qualifying in nature, the second stage being a subjective test, the merit wherein was the determinative factor of selection and, finally a skill test which was again qualifying in nature.

3. As both the petitioner and respondent no.2 qualified the skill test, they were placed in the select list on the basis of their performance in the subjective (written) test, wherein the petitioner obtained 42 marks while the respondent no. 2 obtained 43 marks. Since there was only one vacancy and the respondent no.2 had been placed at serial no.1 in the merit list as against the petitioner who was at serial no.2, the respondent no.2 was selected for appointment as a UDC.

4. Being aggrieved, the petitioner made a representation to the respondent no.1 contending therein that since he was already a regular employee of respondent no.1 having the requisite experience of more than 5 years' of regular service in government organisation, he ought to have been given preference, vis-a-vis the respondent no. 2, who was only a contractual employee. It was urged by the petitioner that not only was the respondent no.2 a contractual employee, but even otherwise she did not have continuous five year service in any government organization or educational institute of repute.

5. Upon the said representation being rejected, the petitioner has approached this Court by way of the present petition.

6. Learned counsel for the petitioner, while reiterating the same pleas as raised by the petitioner in his representation made before the respondent no. 1, submits that as per the conditions laid down by the respondent no.1 in it's advertisement issued in July, 2017, a candidate was required to have 5 years experience of work in a Government financed autonomous body or a Government organisation or an educational institute of repute. He submits that the respondent no.2, though working as a contractual employee with respondent no.1 since 17.09.2008, did not have continuous service of 5 years in any organization as her experience certificate in itself shows that there were intermittent breaks in her service. He, therefore, contends that the petitioner being a regular employee of the respondent no. 1, a government organisation and having the requisite experience of 5 years required for selection to the post of UDC, it is he who ought to have been given preference over respondent no.2, a contractual employee.

7. On the other hand, Ms. Tamali Wad, learned counsel for respondent no. 1 and Mr. Abhay Mani Tripathi, learned counsel for respondent no. 2 while defending the appointment of respondent no. 2, submit that the experience of almost 9 years which the said respondent possessed at the time of submitting her application for selection to the aforesaid post was commensurate with the requisite experience as required under th