JUDGMENT :

Anoop Kumar Dhand, J.

The jurisdiction of this Court has been invoked by the petitioner by filing this writ petition under Article 226 of the Constitution of India with the following prayer:-

“It is, therefore, humbly prayed that this writ petition of the petitioner may kindly be allowed and accepted and by appropriate writ, order or direction;

(i) The respondents may kindly be directed to declare separate cut off marks for the category of persons with benchmark disability.

(ii) The respondents may further be directed to declare revised result after declaring separating cut off marks for the category of persons with benchmark disability and they may further be directed to permit the successful candidates of the category of persons with benchmark disability to appear in main examination.

(iii) Any other appropriate order, or direction which this Hon’ble Court deem fit and proper in favour of the appellant may also kindly be passed.”

2. Brief facts of this case are that an advertisement was issued on 22.07.2021 by the respondents for appointment on the post of Civil Judge Cadre. Total 89 posts were advertised for the year 2020, out of which 4 posts were reserved for the persons with benchmark disabilities and 31 posts were advertised for the year 2021, out of which one post was reserved for this category of specially-abled persons. The advertisement clearly disclose that reservation qua persons with benchmark disability would be horizontal i.e. on their selection qua categories i.e. Scheduled Castes/ Scheduled Tribes/ Other Backward Class/ More Backward Class/Economic Weaker Section, they would be integrated respectively in such category. The advertisement thus did not conceptualize the specially-abled persons to be a distinctly different category from those of General/Women/SC/ST/OBC/MBC/EWS and logically so according to the enjoinment of horizontal reservation.

3. The scheme of selection envisages a preliminary examination followed by main examination and interview. As per clause 15(1) of the advertisement:-The competitive examination for the recruitment to the post of Civil Judge shall be conducted in two stages i.e. preliminary examination and main examination. The marks obtained in the preliminary examination by the candidate who are declared qualified for admission to the main examination will not be counted for determining final merit. As per clause 15(2) of the advertisement;-The number of candidates to be admitted to the main examination will be fifteen times the total number of vacancies (Category-wise) but in the said range all those candidates who secure the same percentage of marks on the last cut-off will be admitted to the main examination.

4. In pursuance of the above advertisement, the petitioner submitted his online application under the category of Other Backward non-creamy layer with benchmark disabilities and he participated in the preliminary examination conducted on 28.11.2021. The result of preliminary examination was declared on 11.01.2022 with the cut-off marks of every category mentioned in the advertisement, other than the specially-abled candidates with benchmark disabilities.

5. Being aggrieved with such action of the respondents, the petitioner has approached this Court with a prayer for issuing directions to the respondents to declare separate cut-off marks for this category of specially-abled persons.

6. Learned counsel for the petitioner argued that where separate vacancies have been advertised for the persons with benchmark disabilities in the advertisement, the respondents were under legal obligation to issue separate cut-off marks for this category. Counsel further argued that such inaction of the respondents is in contravention of the Rajasthan Judicial Service Rules, 2010 (for short “the Rules of 2010”) and the same has violated the fundamental rights of the specially-abled persons contained under Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India.

7. Per contra, learned counsel for the respon