Judgment

Shiva Kirti Singh, J.

1. Heard learned Counsel for the parties. Leave granted.

2. The issue in these appeals is whether the Division Bench of Rajasthan High Court is correct in reversing the judgment of the learned Single Judge and permitting the qualification of B.P. Ed. to be treated as equivalent to qualification of C.P. Ed. for the purpose of selection and recruitment to the post of Physical Training Instructor Grade-III (PTI Gr. III).

3. The facts necessary for deciding the main issue noted above are as follows. Rajasthan Public Service Commission (hereinafter referred to as 'the Commission') published an advertisement dated 03.09.2008 inviting applications for recruitment to the post of PTI Gr. II under Code No. 35 and PTI Gr. III under Code No. 36. The educational qualification for posts under Code No. 35 and 36 were indicated separately and read thus:

(i) Graduate or equivalent examination with diploma in physical education OR Secondary with four years' diploma in Physical Education.

(ii) Working knowledge of Hindi written in Devnagari script and knowledge of Rajasthan culture.

The educational qualification for posts under Code No. 36 read thus:

(i) Senior secondary certificate of Board of Secondary Education recognized by the Government of Rajasthan and Secondary or equivalent examination recognized by the Government of Rajasthan with five subjects, three of them should be Mathematics, English and Hindi with Certificate in Physical Education.

(ii) Working knowledge of Hindi written in Devnagari script and knowledge of Rajasthan culture.

Special note in the advertisement indicated that in Column 11 of OMR application the post of Code No. 35 or Code No. 36 had to be mentioned and separate applications had to be submitted for the two different categories of posts. Through a press note issued on 22.09.2009, the Commission informed the applicants to indicate the post code clearly in the OMR application and in the event of any error in specifying the post code, the result of such candidate shall be cancelled.

4. A combined competitive examination for both the posts was held on 04.10.2009. The Commission, by letter issued on 04.12.2009, directed the candidates to submit their testimonials/documents by 04th January 2010. On 18.12.2009 a news item was published in a daily newspaper that the State Government had directed the Commission to treat such candidates also eligible for appointment to the post of PTI Gr. III who possess Diploma in Physical Education (D.P. Ed.) and/or Degree of Bachelor in Physical Education (B.P. Ed.) on the premise that these qualifications should be treated as higher than or equal to Certificate in Physical Education (C.P. Ed.). For this purpose, the State Government sent a letter to the Commission on 06.01.2010 and thereafter the Commission declared the result on 29.10.2010 wherein it declared such applicants also as successful for the post of PTI Gr. III who held the qualification of B.P. Ed, and had applied for appointment to the post of PTI Gr. II only.

5. Applicants for the post of PTI Gr. III having qualification of C.P. Ed, were aggrieved with the clarification issued by the State Government and the result declared by the Commission on its basis and hence they preferred writ petitions which were allowed on three different occasions. Twice, the Division Bench allowed the Special Appeals only to remand the matter to the learned Single Judge for fresh consideration. The second remand was on the basis of an amendment made in the Rajasthan Education Subordinate Service Rules, 1971 (for brevity, 'the Rules of 1971') vide notification dated 09.12.2011. The Division Bench, by its judgment dated 30th March 2012, observed that amendment made in the Rules of 1971 was not brought to the notice of the Single Bench and, therefore, by agreement of the parties, it set aside the impugned order and matter was remitted to the Single Bench for deciding again for the third time. The learned Single Judge found that the