ORDER

This writ petition has been filed to quash the impugned provisional list of candidates selected after oral interview published by the second respondent in the website on 27.01.2015 for the direct Recruitment for Assistant Professors in Government Arts and Science College under Tamil Nadu Collegiate Educational Service-2012 and consequently revise the selection list by selecting the petitioner under SC Women Category for appointing her as Assistant Professor.

2. The brief facts of the case are that the petitioner has completed MCA in first class in April 2002 and completed M.Phil., degree and passed the State Eligibility Test (SET) for Lectureship in the year 2012. The petitioner belongs to SC community and is have teaching experience of ten years. Thus, she is fully eligible to be appointed as Assistant Professor in colleges as per UGC Regulations. The Teachers Recruitment Board issued Advertisement No. 4/2013, dated, 28.05.2013 to recruit Assistant Professors in Tamil Nadu Collegiate Educational Service-2012. As per the notification, totally there are 1093 vacancies to be filled in various subjects throughout the State of Tamil Nadu. In Computer Science subject, 100 vacancies are to be filled up as per the prospectus. Out of 100 vacancies in the Computer Science subject, 15 seats are reserved for SC candidates. In the SC category, 8 posts are for General turn and one post for SC General Tamil Medium turn. Further, there are 5 vacancies in SC Women turn and one post in SC Women Tamil Medium turn. Since there is no Tamil Medium in Computer Science, the Tamil Medium candidates are added to the SC General and Women turns respectively. In the impugned provisional selection list, 16 SC candidates are selected and thus in practical, there are 10 vacancies in the SC General turn and 6 vacancies in the SC Women turn. As per the UGC Regulation, 2010, the educational qualification stipulated for Assistant Professor is Post Graduate Degree with SET/NET or Ph.D. The UGC Regulations clearly stipulates that PG Degree with SET/NET is equivalent to Ph.D. So both Ph.D. and PG with SET/NET are to be treated equally and should be awarded equal marks. But strangely in the prospectus issued by the second respondent in clause 3.2, Ph.D. holders awarded 9 weightage marks and P.G with SET/NET candidates are awarded only 5 marks for this educational qualification. Hence the contention of the petitioner is that the marks should be awarded equally.

3. The petitioner appeared for certificate verification and oral interview with TRB Roll No.13AP1608775 and out of 34, she was awarded with 21 marks. On 27.01.2015, the second respondent in his website published the provisional list of candidates selected after oral interview. In that list, 16 SC candidates are selected against the notified vacancies of 15. Thus, in the impugned selection list, there are 10 SC General candidates and 6 SC Women candidates. In the provisional selection list SC merit, SC General and SC Women turns are not properly followed and hence the petitioner lost the opportunity to be included in the selection list. Apart from that, the fourth respondent, who is placed as first rank holder is not a Ph.D. holder as on the date of notification. She was awarded 27 marks out of 34. Further, the fifth respondent, who is in the fourth rank of SC category is also not a Ph.D. holder as on the date of notification. But he was awarded with 25 marks. The respondents 4 and 5 and another person, namely, Meena are not entitled for 9 marks for their educational qualification as per UGC Regulation. The educational qualification as on the date of notification shall alone be considered for all selections purposes. The fourth respondent K.P.Lochanambal registered for Ph.D. on 04.07.2008 in Mother Teresa Women's University, Kodaikanal in part time scheme and she was awarded with Ph.D. Degree only on 28.01.2014. The fifth respondent C.Chandrasekar was awarded with Ph.D. Degree from Manonmaniam Sundaranar