The court emphasized the importance of considering submitted documents and affidavits in accordance with advertisement requirements for appointment decisions, citing a similar case precedent.

JUDGMENT

Rekha Borana, J. - An application under Article 226 of the Constitution of India for taking additional documents on record has been preferred on behalf of the petitioner.

2. For the reasons stated in the application, the same is allowed and the documents are taken on record.

3. With the consent of counsel for the parties, the matter has been heard finally.

4. The present petition has been filed with a prayer for consideration of candidature of the petitioner as per her merit for appointment to the post of Teacher Grade-III Level-II for subject Sanskrit in pursuance to the advertisement of the year 2013.

5. The case of the petitioner is that she belonged to OBC category and filled up her application form in the same category. However, the certificate issued to her was of the year 2012 and therefore, in terms of general rules the same was valid for a period of one year. In the year 2013 when the advertisement in question was issued, the petitioner did not possess a fresh OBC (NCL) certificate as required but in view of Clause No. 8(i)(c) of the advertisement, the said certificate ought to have been considered to be valid for a period of three years by the department. After declaration of the result the petitioner’s name found place in the original list and she was even called for document verification. At that stage of document verification, she submitted an affidavit in terms of Clause 8(i)(c) of the advertisement to the effect that she still belonged to the OBC (NCL) category and her affidavit may be taken on record.

6. During the pendency of the recruitment process certain litigation arose and by virtue of that litigation, a revised merit list was issued on 29.08.2017. Name of the petitioner found place in that merit list too but in the final select list her name was not included and aggrieved against the same present writ petition has been filed.

7. Learned counsel for the petitioner submitted that an affidavit in terms of Clause 8(i)(c) of the advertisement was very well filed by her at the time of document verification and the same was even taken on record and therefore, after issuance of the revised merit list in the year 2017, the same ought to have been considered and her name ought to have been included in the final select list.

8. Per contra, learned counsel for the respondents submitted that it was a specific requirement of the advertisement that the OBC (NCL) certificate was to be submitted at the time of submission of online application form and if the same had expired, an affidavit to the effect that the candidate still belonged to the OBC (NCL) category was also required to be submitted at the time of the submission of the online application form only. Admittedly, the said affidavit was submitted by the petitioner at the time of document verification and therefore, the same could not have been considered for the purposes of selection.

9. Heard learned counsel for the parties and perused the material available on record.

10. There is no dispute on the fact that the cut off declared for the OBC (NCL) women category was 178.37 marks and the petitioner obtained 178.85 marks. Therefore, she admittedly stood in merit.

11. However, the dispute is as to whether because of non-submission of the affidavit at the time of submission of application form, as required in terms of Clause 8(i)(c) of the advertisement, the same could not have been considered and the petitioner consequently could not have been considered to be a candidate of OBC (NCL) category. A perusal of the documents as placed on record along with the application filed subsequently by the counsel for the petitioner makes it clear that a report by the competent officer after document verification was made on 07.03.2015 which specifically mentions that OBC certificate as submitted by the petitioner was 18 months’ old and an affidavit to the effect had also been submitted. It is also clear on record that the revised merit list was issued in the year 2017 and the sam