1. As the issues involved in all the writ petitions in hand are similar, these shall stand disposed of vide this common judgment.

2. The facts be noticed as under:

For the purpose of making selection to the various gazetted services in the State of J&K, applications were invited by the J&K Public Service Commis­sion (here-in-after called the Commission), vide its notification dated 30th of December, 2008, from all eligible candidates for appearing in the J&K Combined Competitive Examination, 2009. After the declaration of the result of preliminary examination, all those candidates who were declared successful, had to apply afresh for the main examination in pursuance to the notification issued by the Commission in this regard on 17th of September, 2009. The result of the main examination was declared vide notification dated 30th of September, 2010, and all those candidates whose Roll Nos., appeared in the said notification, were held to be eligible to appear in the interview. The petitioners could not make the grade on the basis of short listing process undertaken by the Commission in issuing the said notifica­tion. It is this notification, which is being questioned in the present peti­tions. Following contentions have been raised by the petitioners:-

a/That Rule 7 of the J&K Reservation Rules, 2005 (here-in-after referred to as the Rules of 2005), has not been complied with while calling the candidates for interview in terms of the impugned notification. Much stress in this regard has been laid on Sub Rules (3) and (4) of Rule 7 of the Rules aforementioned.

b/That the candidates belonging to the reserved categories who have secured more marks and were fully eligible and entitled to be called for interview in the open merit category, have been called for interview in the reserved categories to which they belong.

c/That the standard has been relaxed for calling for interview those candidates of reserved categories who otherwise should have been considered in the open merit category as their merit was higher than some of the candidates who had appeared in open merit category;

d/That the relaxation has been granted by lowering the criteria in order to accommodate the candidates who had opted for Urdu as an optional subject.

On the other hand, in the objections filed by the respondents, it has been stated that the writ petitions are premature as the selection process is still underway. The assertion of the petitioners regarding application of Rule 7 of the Rules of 2005, at this stage, is uncalled for. The said Rule contemplates of select list to be prepared in order of merit which includes the marks obtained in the main examination as also in the interview. There is no provision under the Rules of 2005 to apply the reservation policy at every stage of the examination which is to be conducted for making selection. It is only to be applied when the select list is issued. It is stated that in terms of Rule 8(4) of SRO 387, the candidates who obtain minimum qualifying marks in the written examination, as may be fixed by the Commission, would be summoned for interview. Adopting this principle, a uniform cut-off was adopted which was fixed as 46.89 and accordingly, 1194 candi­dates were short-listed for being called for interview. This was preceded by a report of the examination Monitoring Committee constituted in 12th meeting of the Commission held on 8th of September, 2010. The said Committee consisted of three members. The recommendations of the Com­mittee were accepted by the Commission. On the basis of overall merit position of the candidates in different categories, following figures were reflected:-

In the Open merit category, 675 candidates were required to be called for the interview. Similarly, in RBA category, 240 candidates, in SC category 93, in ST category 120, ALC category 42 and in OSC category 24 candidates have been called for the interview.

On the basis of the cut off it was found that the number of candidates available in SC

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