The court affirmed that visually impaired candidates are entitled to choose their scribes without restrictive qualifications, emphasizing compliance with statutory guidelines.

JUDGMENT :

ARINDAM LODH, J.

By means of filing the present writ petition, the petitioner has urged for issuing a writ of mandamus upon the respondent to provide him a Scribe in the competitive examination.

2. Briefly stated, the facts of the case are that he being a visually impaired with benchmark disability applied for the post of Sub-zonal Development Officer/Dy. Principal Officer in pursuant to the Advertisement No.03/2024, dated 03.02.2024, issued by the Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council (for short, 'TTAADC'), Khumlwng, West Tripura. He submitted the application on 16.02.2024 with a prayer for providing him a scribe from respondent-TTAADC itself since he is a visually impaired candidate. The respondent issued admit card in favour of him to appear in the examination which was scheduled to be held on 09.06.2024, but, that was postponed due to leakage of answer paper of that examination. It is asserted that the petitioner had waited for three months to have the panel of scribe to be formed by the respondent, but he did not get any reply. He submitted another application to the respondent on 28.05.2024, but, no result has been yielded. Subsequently, the examination was rescheduled to be held on 21.07.2024 but since he was not provided with any Scribe, he was not able to appear in the examination. The petitioner approached this Court with an order of Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment dated 01.01.2019 [Annexure-J to the writ petition] referring to an order of Hon'ble Delhi High Court passed in the case of Shri Aditya Narayan Tiwari & Anr. Vs. Union of India & Ors. showing that until and unless the scribe is provided to an aspirant having visually impaired, no department can conduct any examination, however, the Delhi High Court maintained the office memorandum issued on 26.02.2013[Annexure-H to the writ petition] by the Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment, Department of Disability Affairs wherein one of the specific terms and conditions was that a candidate who has 40% or more disability can opt for a scribe of his own and no educational qualification, age, marks scored for the scribe was fixed. But, the respondent denied to follow the memorandum dated 26.02.2013, in spite of that they followed the guidelines issued vide memorandum dated 29.08.2018 [Annexure-I to the writ petition] where the qualification of scribe has been prescribed one step below the qualification of the candidate taking examination. However, the petitioner submitted another application on 18.07.2024 for allowing him to appear in the examination as per office memorandum dated 1^st January, 2019 whereby the Delhi High Court maintained the guidelines dated 26.02.2013. But, the respondents did not give any response to the petitioner and hence, this writ petition.

3. Heard Mr. Samarjit Bhattacharjee, learned amicus curiae appearing for the petitioner. Also heard Mr. B. Debbarma, learned counsel appearing for the respondent-TTAADC.

4. Mr. Bhattacharjee, learned amicus appearing for the petitioner at the very outset has submitted that the petitioner is a candidate with 100 per cent visual disability. He falls under Category-2(r) of the Rights of Persons with Disability Act, 2016 [for short, Act of 2016] having benchmark disability of more than 40%. Mr. Bhattacharjee, learned amicus pointed out that as per Clause (v) of the guidelines of Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment, Govt. of India, dated 29.08.2018 the candidates should have the discretion of opting for his own scribe/reader/lab assistant or request the Examination Body for the same. The examining body may also identify the scribe/reader/lab assistant to make panels at the District/Division/State level as per the requirements of the examination. In such instances the candidates should be allowed to meet the scribe a day before the examination so that the candidates get a chance to check and verify whether the scribe is suitable or not. Further, learned amicus has drawn the atte