2019 Supreme(Gau) 952

IN THE HIGH COURT OF GAUHATI
Kalyan Rai Surana, J.
Uttam Kumar Chakraborty - Appellant
Vs.
State of Assam And Others - Respondents
Writ Petition (Civil) No. 4465 of 2012
Decided On : 28-08-2019

Headnote:

Constitution of India – Article 226 – Right to Information Act, 2005 – Challenge to Merit/Select List – By this writ petition, the petitioner has assailed the merit/select list and all consequential orders issued by the respondent No.2, thereby selecting and appointing the respondent No.4 in the post of Junior Accounts Assistant in the Bongaigaon Treasury – Accordingly, it is submitted by the learned counsel for the petitioner that the marks obtained by the petitioner would have got increased from 233.5 to 240.5 – Similarly, the marks obtained by the respondent No.4 would have reduced from 238.5 to 236.5 – It is further submitted that the respondent No.2 had filed the affidavit- in- opposition through an Extra Assistant Commissioner – However, except for indicating that the examination papers were evaluated by engaging 6 numbers of subject teachers from different Higher Secondary Schools through Inspector of Schools, whose names are disclosed, the statements made in paragraphs 2, 3 and 4 of the writ petition were not denied and accordingly, it is submitted that the grievance of the petitioner that his paper was not correctly evaluated and he would have got 240.5 marks was not contradicted – It is also submitted that in the affidavit-in- opposition filed by the respondent No.2, no reference was made to the answer key supplied to the evaluators – Held, Thus, the denial of marks to the petitioner in respect of the correct answer given to the effect that Mrs. Pratibha Devi Singh Patil was the 13th President of India, it is apparent that the answer- scripts were not properly examined by the evaluators – Thus, it is seen that unless it is shown that the applicable Rules provide for re-evaluation, Courts should not, normally as a matter of routine, issue direction for reevaluation – The petitioner has made his own assessment of comparative marks awarded to the three candidates and he has taken a view that he can succeed only by challenging the selection of respondent No.4 – However, the non- joinder of the other selected candidate for the post of Junior Accounts Assistant, appears to be coming in the way for directing a re-evaluation of the answer scripts on the basis of orders passed in this writ petition as because if the answer scripts is required to be re-evaluated, it cannot be the re-evaluation of the answer scripts of two candidates only i.e. the petitioner and the respondent No.4, because, it might be possible that in course of re-evaluation, although the selection and appointment of other selected candidate is not assailed, the position of the said selected candidate might be disturbed – Accordingly, the writ petition cannot succeed due to non- joinder of other selected candidate as a necessary party in this writ petition – The learned counsel for the petitioner has not been able to show that there is a specific statement in the writ petition that the answer-sheets of the said selected candidate was correctly evaluated without any error in awarding of marks – Therefore, although the evaluation of the answer-sheets of the respondent No.4 in respect of seriatim of Mrs. Pratibha Devi Singh Patil as Thirteenth Presidnet of India is found to be incorrect, but there are reasonable grounds to apprehend that the same incorrect evaluation could have occurred in the answer-sheets of other candidates for the post of Junior Accounts Assistant – Therefore, if the selection process is bad, being erroneous, the entire selection process must be set aside, and it would be inequitable to set aside and quash the selection and consequential appointment of respondent No.4 alone – In view of the discussions above, this writ petition fails and the same stands dismissed – Petition Dismissed