Point of Law: Hon'ble Court has held that regulations framed by Board to provide actual marks obtained in supplementary examination to be added in main examination are to be added for question of merit.

ORDER :

1. No assistance of the lawyer on behalf of the petitioners is available today.

2. These writ petitions under Article 226 of the Constitution of India have been preferred, in sum and substance, with the following prayers, and for the sake of convenience, the prayer clauses are being taken from the case, S.B. Civil Writ Petition No.17137/2022:-

“i) the action of the respondents while not considering the actual percentage of Sr. Secondary i.e. 28.70 marks (70% of 41.00%) for determining the total marks of the petitioner which comes) to (30+28.70=58.70) marks and instead awarding (30+25.34=55.34) marks for the purpose of recruitment on the post of LDC and depriving the petitioner to get appointment on the post of LDC despite the fact that the petitioner secured 57 marks in English Subject Supplementary Examination, may kindly be declared per se illegal, unjust, arbitrary, bad in the eye of law and further violative to Article 14, 16 and 21 of the Constitution of India; and / or

ii) the respondents may kindly be directed to award (28.70+30 = 58.70) marks to the petitioner instead of (25.34+30 = 55.34) marks in pursuance of the circular dated 27.03.2014 (Annexure-9) and invited the petitioner for document verification and offer appointment to the petitioner on the post of LDC in SBC (Male) category, with all consequential benefits; and/or”

3. The controversy in these petitions is that a recruitment was initiated by the respondent-Panchayati Raj Department for direct recruitment on the post of Lower Division Clerk (LDC) under Rajasthan Panchayati Raj Rules, 1996. The criteria for adjuging the merits of the candidate were prescribed under Rule 273 of the Rules of 1996, which was to the effect that, “a candidate would be awarded 70% weightage of the percentage of marks obtained in Senior Secondary Examination”. The advertisement was issued by the respondents and there was also a provision of bonus marks. The recruitment got mired in controversy regarding bonus marks and thus, got prolonged.

4. The bone of contention in the litigation is the calculation of the marks of Senior Secondary, in the cases where candidates had appeared in the supplementary examination. The petitioners are those candidates, who are seeking counting of actual marks obtained in supplementary examination of Senior Secondary whereas the stand of the State is that minimum passing marks obtained in supplementary examination of Senior Secondary ought to be counted for the purpose of computing the marks.

5. The petitioners present in person have relied upon the Circulars dated 13.07.2013 and 27.03.2014. They further submit that since in the academic session of 2011-2012, the amendment was made by the Board itself, and was accepted by all concerned; that actual marks obtained in the supplementary shall be counted for calculating the merit of the secondary examination.

6. The petitioners present in person referred to the judgment rendered by a Division Bench of this Hon'ble Court in the matter of The State of Rajasthan & Ors. Vs. Pradeep Singh (D.B. Civil Special Appeal (Writ) No.578/2016 decided along with another connected matter on 14.09.2016.

The relevant portion of the judgment reads as follows:-

“5. We have considered the submissions on behalf of the parties.

6. Section 3 of the Act provides for the incorporation of the Board of Secondary Education for Rajasthan which shall have perpetual succession and a common seal. Section 4 provides for composition of the Board including nominated members and co-opted members. Section 9 provides for the powers and functions of the Board which includes conduct of public examinations and publication of the results of the examinations amongst other things. Section 36 empowers the Board to frame Regulations and Section 38 empowers the Board to make alterations to the same. The Regulations framed by the Board as existing in 1991 provided that the minimum marks obtained in the supplementary examination would be added to the other