The court confirmed that cut-off dates for eligibility in recruitment processes can be set independently from application deadlines, ensuring clarity and fairness, as reflected in the Delhi Higher Judicial Service Rules.

JDUGMENT :

C. HARI SHANKAR, J.

1. The petitioner aspires to enter the Delhi Higher Judicial Service, [“DHJS”, hereinafter]

2. The petitioner is the holder of a BA (Hons) English degree from the University of Delhi, followed by LLB from the Chaudhary Charan Singh University, Meerut. She, thereafter, enrolled as an advocate with the Bar Council of Uttar Pradesh on 31 December 2015. She cleared the All India Bar Examination on 21 May 2016 and was issued a Certificate of Practice. She has, since, been practising before courts at Meerut.

3. During the course of her practice, the petitioner also obtained her LLM degree from the Maharishi University of Information Technology, Lucknow in June 2023. She is presently perusing her Ph.D. in Investment Arbitration from the Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University.

4. The petitioner attained the age of 35 on 9 September 2024.

5. On 27 December 2024, a vacancy notice was issued by this Court, inviting online applications from eligible candidates for participating in the Delhi Higher Judicial Service Examination 2024, [“DHJSE 2024”, hereinafter] against the 25% direct recruitment quota. Applications for undertaking the DHJSE 2024 could be submitted from 27 December 2024 till 10 January 2025. The preliminary written examination is to be held on 2 February 2025. The qualifications for direct recruit aspirants to the DHJS were thus set out in the vacancy notice:

“The qualifications for direct recruits shall be as follows:-

(1) must be a citizen of India.

(2) must have been continuously practising as an Advocate for not less than seven years as on the last date of receipt of applications, i.e., 10.01.2025.

(3) must have attained the age of 35 years and have not attained the age of 45 years on the 1^st day of January of the year in which the applications for appointment are invited, i.e., on 01.01.2024.”

6. The petitioner is aggrieved by condition (3) in the aforesaid public notice dated 27 December 2024 issued by this Court, to the extent it stipulates 1 January 2024 as the date by which the candidate aspiring to attempt the DHJSE 2024 had to have attained the age of 35. By the present writ petition, the petitioner seeks a modification in this criterion, to the extent of fixing 1 January 2025 or, in the alternative, 10 January 2025. instead of 1 January 2024, as the cut-off date by which the candidate had to have attained the age of 35.

7. We have heard Ms. Bhabna Das, learned Counsel for the petitioner and Dr. Amit George, learned Counsel for the respondent, at length.

8. Ms. Das advances, essentially, three contentions.

9. Ms. Das’s first contention is predicated on the impugned stipulation itself. She submits that the stipulation is contradictory in terms. According to Ms. Das, “the 1^st day of January of the year in which the applications for appointment are invited” would not be 1 January 2024, but 1 January 2025. Inasmuch as, the applications for the DHJSE 2024 could be submitted till 10 January 2025, she submits that the invitation for applications continued till 10 January 2025.

10. In that view of the matter, Ms. Das’s contention is that 2025 has to be treated as the year in which applications are invited, thereby rendering the 1^st day of January of the said year as 1 January 2025, and not 1 January 2024.

11. Ms. Das’s second contention is that, by fixing 1 January 2024 as the cut-off date for the aspiring candidates to have attained the age of 35, a large number of candidates, including her client, who have attained the age of 35 between 1 January 2024 and 10 January 2025 would become ineligible for consideration