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2025 Supreme(Online)(Pat) 292
PATNA HIGH COURT
HONOURABLE , ACJ, HONOURABLE MR. PARTHA SARTHY, J
Neha Parween – Appellant
Versus
The State of Bihar – Respondent
Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No.752 of 2025 | Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No. 369 of 2025 | Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No. 978 of 2025 | Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No. 1437 of 2025 | Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No. 1723 of 2025 | Civil Writ Jurisdiction Case No. 2842 of 2025
For the Appellants/Petitioners:Mr. Abhijit Anand, Advocate, Ms.Sweta Kumari, Advocate, Mr.Y.V.Giri, Sr. Advocate, Mr.Pranav Kumar, Advocate, Ms. Shrishti Singh, Advocate, Mr. Devashish Giri, Advocate, Mr. Ashok Kumar Dubey, Advocate, Mr. Chandan Kumar, Advocate, Md. Fazle Karim, Advocate, Mr. Abhinav Shrivastava, Sr. Advocate, Mr.Raushan, Advocate, Mr. Santosh Kumar Pandey, Advocate, Ms.Roona, Advocate, Mr. Sanjay Kumar, Advocate, Mr. Pratiyush Kumar, Advocate
For the Respondents:Mr. Lalit Kishore, Sr. Advocate, Mr. Sanjay Pandey, Advocate, Mr. Ayush Kumar, Advocate, Mr. Kanishka Shankar, Advocate, Mr. Nishant Kumar Jha, Advocate, Mr. Ratnesh Kumar, Sr. CGC, Mrs. Parul Prasad, CGC, Mr. Aditya Anand, Advocate, Mr. Rajiv Ranjan, Advocate, Mrs. Nivedita Nirvikar, Sr. Advocate, Mr. Arya Achint, Advocate, Mrs. Karishma Aware, Advocate, Mr. P.K.Shahi, A.G., Mr. Vikas Kumar, Advocate, Mr. Amritesh Kumar, Advocate
Court upheld examination integrity, ruling no systemic failure justified total cancellation; issues localized to one center did not mandate a re-examination for all candidates.
Headnote:(A) Constitution of India - Articles 14 and 16 - Examination Conduct - Cancellation of 70th Combined (Preliminary) Competitive Examination contested, citing systemic failure, administrative mismanagement, wrong key-answers, and malpractices - Petitioners demanded re-examination for fairness and transparency, asserting violations undermined Constitutional values - Commission argued the process was fair with minimal complaints, having conducted re-examination only where disturbances occurred. (Paras 1-5, 27, 33, 35)
(B) Examination Integrity - Court emphasized the necessity to uphold public confidence in recruitment processes, citing principles ensuring fairness and transparency - The validity of the examination was upheld where no systemic failure demonstrated apart from disturbances at a single examination center. (Paras 2, 3, 29, 36)
(C) Judicial Review - The Court asserted that malpractices could only justify total cancellation of examinations if systemic flaws compromised integrity, distinguishing between tainted and untainted candidates. (Paras 31, 41)
(D) Re-examination Protocol - Court ruled re-examination for all students not mandated where issues localized and manageable. (Paras 33, 45) (
Findings of Court:
No systemic malpractice proven at examination centers except one; petitioners failed to provide sufficient evidence of widespread failures; calls for reforms in examination administration noted.
Result: Petitions dismissed.)
| Table of Content |
|---|
| 1. ensuring fair examination process. (Para 1 , 2 , 4) |
| 2. arguments for and against examination integrity. (Para 3 , 5 , 8) |
| 3. allegations of examination malpractice. (Para 7 , 9 , 12) |
| 4. details for establishing the legitimacy of complaints. (Para 10 , 11 , 13) |
| 5. judicial scrutiny of public interest litigation. (Para 14 , 16 , 22) |
| 6. response and investigation by examination authorities. (Para 18 , 19 , 20) |
| 7. procedures for managing and evaluating examinations. (Para 21 , 23 , 24) |
| 8. scrutiny of examination irregularities. (Para 40) |
CAV JUDGMENT
(Per: HONOURABLE THE ACTING CHIEF JUSTICE)
Date : 28-03-2025 The common prayer in all the writ petitions, including the PIL, is cancellation of integrated 70th Combined (Preliminary) Competitive Examination, conducted by the Bihar Public Service Commission (for short ‘the Commission’), held on 13.12.2024 and 04.01.2025 and for holding a re-examination on the grounds of (i) systemic failure of the Commission in conducting a free and fair examination; (ii) logistical and administrative mismanagement at examination centres; (iii) impermissibility of holding two Preliminary Examinations; (iv) prevaricating stand of the Commission with respect to normalization; (v) wrong key-answers; (vi) unfair answer evaluation process; (vii) malpractices at the examination centres; (viii) strong chances of paper leak; and (ix) completely opaque methodology for coming out with a combined merit-list, without taking into account the equal standard of rigour for the students, thus offending Articles
14 and 16 of the Constitution of India .
2. It has been argued by all the petitioners that the above-noted grounds have led to the process of examination and the result being shrouded/mired in controversy. It is the assertion of the petitioners that for maintaining the purity of the examination process as also for restoring faith in the system, the only way now is to hold a re-examination in a fair manner. Not doing so, it has been urged, would erode the Constitutional values, which undergird Articles 14 and 16 of the Constitution of India , mandating that selection process conducted by public authorities must be fair, transparent and accountable. Any irregularity in the process gives rise to doubts whether the process has resulted in denial of equal access to all persons and in that case, the entire process gets tainted, requiring cancellation of examination/result and holding of fresh examination.
3. The countervailing arguments on behalf of the Commission and the State are that the process was fair and all care was taken to conduct the examination in a proper manner with very limited complaints regarding mismanagement at Bapu Pariksha Parisar (for short ‘BPP’), the centre with maximum examinees, and few of the key- answers being wrong. But those issues were resolved by referring the wrong key-answers to the Committee of Experts who have given their reasons for selecting the correct answer; and the Commission in its wisdom and experience chose to conduct a re-examination for the candidates of BPP centre only and not for other 912 centres in the entire State of Bihar. The result of successful candidates in the Preliminary Examination has been published in which approximately 21000 students have passed the examination. Their careers could not be lightly dealt with. It was reiterated that there is a need to preserve public confidence in the sanctity of the selection process, but at the same time, there is a requirement of observing fairness towards candidates who invest time and resources in attempting to clear through a selection process and both these considerations have a Constitutional foundation, going beyond service and administrative law principles.
4. Animadverting to the unfairness in the holding of examination, the petitioner in PIL, whose locus has seriously been challenged, has pointed out that (a) the Commission had issued notification on 23.09.2024, inviting on-line applications but without gi
