The withdrawal of vacancies after examination completion violates candidates' legitimate expectations and procedural fairness, but administrative constraints can justify the action.

ORDER

Hon’ble Dr. Anand S. Khati, Member (A)

By way of the present Original Application (O.A.), the applicants are seeking the following reliefs:-

“(a)Quash the impugned inaction of Respondents being arbitrary, malafide, discriminatory and illegal; and direct the respondents to restore the vacancies which SSC has declared in its FINAL VACANCY List and release the result for the post of AAOs.

b) prayed that the O.A. be allowed and the impugned order of withdrawal of Vacancies for the post of AAO be quashed and the respondents be commanded to proceed ahead with the selection already undertaken and draw a merit list accordingly.

and/or

(c) Direct the respondents to produce all the records of the case along with their reply for perusal by this Hon'ble Tribunal;

(d) Allow the cost of this application to the applicant.

(e) Pass such other orders or reliefs as deemed fit and proper in the facts and circumstances of the case in the favour of the applicant and against the respondents."

2. Brief facts of the case, as put forth by the learned counsel for the applicants, are that:

2.1 The respondent No.3 – Staff Selection Commission (SSC) issued Notification dated 03.04.2023 for filling up various Group ‘B’ and ‘C’ vacancies in different Ministries and Departments of Central Government through SSC CGL Examination (CGLE), 2023. The CGLE is held in two stages, viz. Tier-1 and Tier-2. Tier-1 is compulsory and qualifying in nature. In Tier-2 Exam, there are Paper I, II and III, out of which Paper-I is compulsory for all posts, Paper-II is for candidates to the post of Junior Statistical Officer (JSO) and Paper-III is for the post of Assistant Audit Officer/Assistant Accounts Officer (AAO). The marks scored in Tier- 2 are considered for final selection for the vacancies announced through the Examination.

2.2 The applicants herein appeared for CGLE 2023 for the post of AAO in hope of seeking appointment and secured very high marks in Tier-1 (Prelims) and Paper-I and Paper-III of Tier-2, and hence, they were sure of getting the post. However, when the result was released on 04.12.2023 (Annexure A-1), to their utter shock, the SSC did not allot the post of AAO to any candidate and it has been mentioned that the user department, i.e. Comptroller and Auditor General of India (CAG), has withdrawn the vacancies.

2.3 He pointed out that the AAO is the only Gazetted post through CGLE and a very high cutoff is required in Tier-1 exam in order to be eligible to appear in Tier-2 for the post of AAO, which is evident from the merit list.

2.4 After conducting the examination for Tier-1, the SSC on 18.08.2023 reported tentative 556 vacancies in the Department of CAG, i.e. 253 for AAO, 153 for Auditor and 150 for Accountant.

2.5 Tier-1 results were declared on 19.09.2023 (Annexure A/4) in which 4377 candidates cleared higher cut off for AAO posts in their respective categories. The merit list of candidates who qualified after securing very high cutoff is as follows:

“List-1 : Candidates shortlisted in Tier-I for appearing in Tier-II [Paper-I and Paper-III {General Studies (Finance & Economics)} (for the post of Assistant Audit Officer and Assistant Accounts Officer):

*In addition to the UR candidates shown above, 30-SC, 2-ST, 713-OBC, 369-EWS and 2-OH candidates qualifying at UR cut- off at this stage, have been shown under their respective categories.

Note 1: VH candidates qualifying in their respective vertical categories have not been considered eligible for List-1 as the posts are not identified suitable for VH candidates in the notice of the previous year examination i.e. CGLE 2021.”

2.6 The applicants along with other aspirants appeared in Tier-2 examination conducted on 26.10.2023 & 27.10.2023, for which tentative answer key was